Ambivalence
by Marume Chiisa
Summary: When IV was suddenly appointed as the 'temporary' King and Rio was desperately trying to avoid an undesirable arranged marriage, the two decided to get into Marriage-by-Politic scheme. What was once more of a daredevil slowly turns into a roller-coaster of messed-up relationship; both their own and their countries. A collection of oneshots set in Kingdom-AU, Accidentshipping
1. Chapter 1: Scar

**Ambivalence**

~ **A Collection of** **Oneshots** ~

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 **Summary** : When IV was suddenly appointed as the ' _temporary_ ' King and Rio was desperately trying to avoid an undesirable arranged marriage, the two decided to get into Marriage-by-Politic scheme. What was once more of a daredevil slowly turns into a roller-coaster of messed-up relationship; both their own and their countries. A collection of oneshots set in Kingdom-AU, focuses mostly on _Yu-Gi-Oh! Zexal_ 's IV (Thomas Arclight) and Rio in their ambivalent relationships.

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 **Author's note** : first of all, this is my second fic and I still can't believe it myself! IV and Rio may be the first anime characters that woke up both my drawing and writing muse—so much that I felt the need to write this before I turn delusional, LOL, JK, I already am delusional. Indeed, I've written past-AU oneshots in my other fic, " ** _Scar_** ", set in their past-life kind of thing (with reference from the original storyline), but this one is more like a full-AU kind of thing. This fic is inspired from several fics, namely; " ** _Of Sparrows and Princes_** " fic by _sllebswap _(can be found in my fav story section), a fic of BelHaru pairing from KHR, DG (Draco x Ginny) fics titled " ** _Contractual Obligations_** " by _gidge_8_ , " ** _Hesperides' Apple_** " by _ogygiasylph_ , and " ** _Silence_** " by _serinah_ (can be found in my fav sections of FIA page). And since ' _Hesperides' Apple_ ' was inspired from the story of Hades and Persephone, this story is, arguably, has little elements from the myth too, LOL. :p

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 **Warning** : This fanfic is specifically themed _romance_ for an obvious reason. This IS the super-cheesy romance flicks for hopeless romantics like meh. Even though it is set in a fantasy setting, I honestly have no idea on how to write a proper fantasy novel that I always ended up writing drama set in fantasy setting, seriously. So, this fic is prolly going to focus solely on the two main characters and their relationship with only a slight mention of political problem every here and there. Other thing to note is that this fic is a bit darker, with heavy romance undertone. There are several mature contents like sexual-intercourse, maybe even in a non-consensual way, and a few mentions of nudity and blood—among other things. _You have been warned_. **M** -rated chapter will be marked at the start, so you can avoid it if you don't want to read it, with the risk of losing some major plot point :p. Oh, and also, this fic consists of several oneshots that loosely connected to each other written in chronological order (mostly, but _maybe_ not all of it). If you're confused reading it, that's probably my fault for popping out random incoherent ideas in the first place. Now, you have been warned, _twice_.

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 **P.S.** To avoid confusion, let this humble writer clarify that IV's actually just an alias, and it's literally read 'four', after Roman numeral. His real name is Thomas Arclight. His brothers are III (Three/ Michael A.), and V (Vee/Christopher A.), I'll go with that for most part of this story. Their real names might be used some times for dramatic effect. Any other names used in this story are from the original anime series, not the dub.

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Do I have to do this at the start of every fanfic? Hell, yes I do. I get anxious easily. The cover was drawn by me, but I kinda messed the title font since I'm just that suck at designing book cover. Cough… ahem. Okay, let's just start!

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 **Chapter 1: Scar**

 ** _Disclaimer_** _: Of course I don't own YGO Zexal,_ _heck, I don't even own the general concept of cheesy-romance flicks. So, shut up and just read if you want. XOXO_

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It was hot.

The marketplace was bustling with activities; selling, buying, talking, yelling, not much different than that in his city except for strong fishy smell—literally speaking—and the blazing sun hanging right above their head. How could anyone walk down an open street under the scorching sunray and even some stayed there to sell things for almost half a day?

The climate surely had taken him by surprise at first, but he had a lot more pressing matters to worry other than the heat. He pulled up the hood of his cloak to cover his maroon red and golden lock that was easily spotted among the crowds. Not that there wasn't anyone else with similar coloring than him, but the unruly, spiky end was what gave it away. He just needed to keep a low profile for a three to five more days, and then he was free.

Ha, they hadn't even realized that he had been with them all along the cruise to this land, what a bunch of nincompoop, he mentally laughed as he waded through sea of people, making his way to nowhere in particular. It was his first time being in the United Land of Poseidon and there was still a lot to take in to fill his time.

The people didn't speak that much different language than he did back home, probably a slight hint of accent every here and there, but nothing that would hinder his attempt at conversation with the locals. Of course they knew almost instantly that he wasn't locals and even some had guessed right that he had come with the people from 'up the mountains'—or so they called his people. But they didn't prod him as to why he wasn't with the rest of the crew or why did he choose to spend his first night at some rundown pub inn instead of their own ship.

 _Must be nice being in a time of peace, huh?_ He mused. Not that he was complaining about this situation, but due to his upbringing, he couldn't help but to watch too many unnecessary details to prepare should something happened out of his prediction. But then again, he hadn't planned this at all when he decided that it was his chance to get away from that stuck-up kingdom. So, he was in a rather contradicting situation right now.

He brought some money, enough to last him a good few weeks, but he couldn't rely on it to last forever, and bringing too much of it would attract too much attention anyway. But now he had to think of something to make sure he could continue on with this journey. Maybe he should try to find some job, and first, he needed to look around to get the hang of things around here.

With that being said, he talked some more with the locals about mundane things at first, then escalated into a stealth interrogation while having lunch. After he was done, he went out to the street again, which looked visibly more spacious than a few hours earlier, probably because most of the people had gone back to attend to their routines.

Now, what should he do?

The red-and-gold haired young man hadn't realize it at first, but now that he had nothing in particular to do, he felt like he had too many spare times on his hands that he wasn't sure what to do next. If he asked too many questions to people, it would only make him look suspicious, and he couldn't draw attention any more than he had. Maybe he should've brought more men to accompany him, but that would ruin the 'sneaking' part. Besides, he was never good at working as a team and more people would mean more unpredictable moves in his otherwise stealthy plan.

But the more he thought about it in his newfound spare times, the more he realized that he wasn't a good planner either. Maybe this was why he always lost to his brothers and father when it came to chess. No, he had known that long before, he just didn't know how much it would impact the decision-making part of his brain. As much as he didn't like things his father had made him do, he couldn't deny that it did him many good if he could just put his head into it.

Unfortunately he couldn't. Not most of the time, at least.

 _Well, isn't now the time?_ He thought dryly, knowing that some things just couldn't be found when one needed it the most. In this case, it was his lack of training. It hadn't seeped deep enough into his marrow for him to make a split second decision with such quality. If his brother knew about it, he would definitely never hear the end of it.

The young man sighed dejectedly as he admitted his defeat silently. Nobody should know about it and his initial plan now had shifted into that of sneaking back into the ship to go back to his home country and rethink his whole plan. There were only a few more details he needed to watch out for, and more importantly…

"Why aren't you with the other men?" a voice asked—a girl's voice—that he snapped out of his train of thought to look for the one asking. For all he knew, it might not have been directed to him, but he just had to make sure since the question was too spot on.

"Ah, I'm sorry, Rio-sama. I have a special errand from the King," the man in question answered, looking rather flustered. He recognized that reaction; that particular man had been assigned something important in which he wasn't able to openly explain. He wondered if the 'special assignment' was to tail some mysterious character trying to blend into the crowd. Maybe it was him?

No, he was sure he had been really careful since he arrived, he'd know if he was being followed. His brother had been doing that whenever he tried to wander off where he shouldn't be, so he had confidence that he couldn't be that easily caught off guard. Although there were also reasons that this was different surroundings than the one he used to and therefore dulled his senses. Besides, judging from the obvious mistake he had made (still wearing his uniform), it looked like the assignment was a recent development, most likely issued not long ago in a hurry—this morning, perhaps? But that still didn't mean he wasn't the one being tailed, he was this close to them, after all.

The girl seemed to understand the unspoken meaning behind it and said, "Oh, if it's a special assignment, make sure you don't wander around in your uniform. It's drawing too much attention. Uniforms are only for those moving in group," she stated with low voice, just loud enough for a handful of people around her to hear, but with his now-heightened senses, he could hear them loud and clear.

Now, this was bad. The soldier was another thing, but she was clearly of some importance by the way she was talking and how the soldier talked to her. He had to stay away from such character…

His thought was cut short when someone bumped his shoulder rather hard that he was being shoved aside in his dumbfounded state. There was an incoherent shouting, followed by a series of frightened screams. He looked back, trying to find what had caused such uproar when his eyes were met with something glinting under the sunlight.

Almost reflexively, he reached out to the hand holding the sharp object and shoved the cloaked figure away from the crowd. Whoever that was would definitely cause damage to people. It wasn't as if it was his business, but his reflex reacted anyway. Maybe it was the fact that he was really that close to being wounded, so it was merely self-defense. Nevertheless, he already had his (or maybe her?) hand and all he needed to do was to pin the mysterious figure down to the ground and let the mob take care of the rest.

What he didn't take into account was the possibility that the perpetrator might still have hidden weapon in their free hand, which was now being lashed out and would soon crash into the side of his face hadn't he dodged it. He pulled his head back just quick enough for the blade's tip not to cause any fatal damage but he could still feel it grazed against his cheek as he backed away.

The mysterious figure leaped out to their feet and pounced on him once again for good measure, and once more, he had to dodge by a hair breadth. The blade (he presumed a small knife of some sort) sliced lightly through his skin but he didn't back away this time; he flung his upper body at the figure and threw his fists towards its hooded face. There was no time for subtlety, _the hell with this rascal_ , he thought as the figure fell on the ground and he proceeded to kneel beside them to deliver another series of punches.

The crowd gasped; some of them tried to pull him away from the culprit and seeing that his initial plan to make use of the mob had succeeded, he let himself being hauled away. He had prepared himself to be interrogated and all that, but he was taken aback when he heard a familiar voice asking, "Are you okay? You're bleeding!"

 _Shit, the girl!_ He cursed mentally and immediately covered the bloodied right side of his wounded face. It wasn't that big deal of a slice wound, but he couldn't afford to be found out. If the girl was who he had suspected, she would, most likely, report him to the higher ups.

"I'm fine," he said gruffly, averted his glance as to not meet her eyes, all the while looking around for an opening to escape.

"I don't know if I can do much, but let me heal—" the girl started to offer but he cut her short.

"I'm fine," he reiterated and stood back to his feet. He had to get away from here while the crowd was still busy.

The girl called when he started to walk away, but he ignored it and made his way through sea of people. The ruckus had caused quite a spectacle that many people were now flocking around it. Before long, he finally strayed away from the throng and wasted no time reaching the nearest alleyway.

After he was safe and alone (not exactly alone, of course, but with considerably less people around), he lowered his palm only to find out that it was drenched in blood. He hadn't expected the wound to be that bloody. Maybe he should've let her heal the wound first. Even if he managed to get some healing back home, it'd be too late by then. Healing would only be effective while the wound was still fresh, any later than that would only speed up the recovery, but would not fully zip the wound. Besides, there would definitely be questions as to how he got it in the first place later when he got back home.

Oh, it was too late to think about it now anyway. The least he could do now was to stay hidden until it was time to go home; easier said than done now that he had something to be identified with. He should change place, anywhere around the castle was fine, as long as he wouldn't miss the ship's departure.

And then, he would rethink another escape plan.

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 ** _Word Count_** _: 1,955_

 _Prologue up, but I decided to mark it as 'Chapter 1', so that I won't mess the chapter naming. Reviews are always welcome! And 'Scar' isn't abandoned! I merely have no idea what to write next for the time being, lol. Meanwhile, I've written this fic for quite some times now and just decided to publish it recently. So, it's prolly going to be updated regularly until I run out of stock :p_

 _ **P.S.** Yes, I once published this story and deleted it because I thought I'd rewrite the premise. I did rewrite it, mostly IV's characterization in later chapter, but not for this one (only a slight grammar and summary edit). So, if any of you have read the initial published work, this chapter isn't going to be much different, XD_


	2. Chapter 2: V

**Chapter 2: V**

 ** _Disclaimer_** _: Of course I don't own YGO Zexal, heck, I don't even own the general concept of cheesy-romance flicks. So, shut up and just read if you want. XOXO_

 ** _A/N_** _Yes, the chapter's title is a nod to my theory about V's name… LOL. For those who haven't read my super-long author's note in 'Scar', here's a little hint: see if you can make a V with your fingers and guess what numbers it makes. :p_

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IV was not happy.

The young Prince of the Arclight Kingdom had just returned from a hunting trip when the head servant announced that he was called by the King to the throne room. Since he had just returned, he decided to go straight there without first changing his grime-caked apparel after two days straight of not taking bath. He was in desperate need for a hot bath but also knew it would tick his older brother, the King, off seeing his underdressed state.

As a kid, IV had always enjoyed playing around with his brothers; mostly pulling prank on the older one. V had always been proper and obedient, constantly reminding his two younger brothers not to frolicking around while IV couldn't help but feeling contrary most of the time, leaving III, the youngest one, at the intersection of choosing between the two. Often times, the youngest Prince would take on IV's side just to make sure that his brother would not to go too far, but troubles always seemed to be able to find its way for IV, anyway, and it only got worse since V was declared as the King.

Five years ago, their father had retired from active duty, and since then, V had been appointed as the King—though in name only. Byron was still practically ruling the land from behind the desk while V acted as the face to prepare him to fully rule the kingdom someday. He almost pitied his brother for having to take such role, but V was always the obedient one and was really made for the position. Besides, as the oldest of the Arclight brothers, it was only natural that he would inherit the title sooner or later. He and his younger brother would only inherit it if something happened to the older one—which wasn't something that would seem to happen in the near future, given how peaceful their country had been in the past few years. As such, he had never bothered himself with his supposed-royal duties anymore since they held his coming-of-age ceremony at 18, almost 5 years ago. He would go to a hunting trip for a few days straight without coming back, going to the neighboring country to visit a friend under the pretext of maintaining good relation, and next time, he would like to travel across the ocean if he could gain permission to build his own boat and form a crew.

The thing was, his father was okay and quite open with his idea, but V refused vehemently, saying that he needed to be taught more about responsibility before he could do as he wanted. He had craftily avoided the subject for the last few years and was pretty convinced that this one was going to be one of his brother's attempts of getting him to take responsibilities—which was something he never looked forward to.

As he made his way deeper into the castle through hallway adorned with boring, stiff paintings of their predecessors at one side of the wall and huge windows on the other, displaying no small amount of shrubberies and rows of trees that was dubbed as the 'wild garden' by the staffs, he finally reached a pair of huge wooden door—at least twice his height—with a guard standing on each side. The throne room was probably the only room in the whole palace that had the highest ceiling. Their castle was, at least, seven stories high to the highest tower—10 feet high each. This particular room, although only stood at four stories high, was the only one that wasn't divided into floors. Ironically, it was the most spacious room in the entire building, but was also the one he always felt suffocated whenever he was inside. The towering pillars around the room felt like it was closing in on him and the cylindrical shape with painted, dome-shaped ceiling, which some people found to be rather pretty basking in sparkling light coming from the huge crystal chandelier up above and all that, but he always found himself getting dizzy just by moving around in it—not to mention that the chandelier might fall off at any time, given how thin the chain that suspended the whole structure. Even more important was what would always happen inside—which he couldn't stand the most.

He never liked the place as everything felt stiff and nothing relaxing ever announced there. Even if the King declared that everything was alright, every member of the Royal Palace knew that it was just put-up gimmick to assure the masses as to not cause unrest. A Royal member being called there was almost always meant something of a great importance, and he couldn't stand the thick, serious atmosphere whenever it happened—even if he wasn't the subject of the whole ordeal.

When the red-and-gold haired Prince entered the circular room, his father and brother had already waited there—his older brother sat on the throne at the other end of the room straight from the door he came in, while their father was standing by its side. They didn't look particularly pissed or worried or something equally grave, but that was the expression they always put whenever they were out in public, so that barely meant anything. They had been trained to keep their real feelings inside and only show what was necessary to gain the people's trust, as well as to maintain their dignity.

Of course, as the second in line of the succession of the throne, he wasn't excluded from such training and after years of grueling lesson of controlling one's expression and anticipating other's response, he could also play the charming leader thing if the situation called for it. But of course, he preferred not to, just to be contrary to his brother.

"How was the trip, IV?" Byron started, his deep voice echoed in the room.

"I believe you've heard the announcement when I returned. What's the point of repeating it?" he retorted sharply, didn't mind the slightest of his supposed-good manner. They didn't even mention his appearance—although his brother looked visibly irritated but said nothing—and he hated it when they purposely acted civil in front of him. It made the impression that they were hiding, or trying to convey something they knew he wouldn't like—which only made him doubly irritated when the bomb was finally dropped.

Byron chuckled softly and proceeded, "Alright, since you don't seem too keen on idle talk, let's just get down to business, shall we?"

Again, IV didn't even bother to hide the fact that he was rolling his eyes. V looked like he was ready to stand up and berate him, but managed to hold down the urge as he cleared his throat and said, "We've decided that it's time you take some responsibilities, IV."

IV rolled his magenta orbs again. "Big news, huh? Well, why do you think I went to the wood for; to find a place to lie around without you pestering every damn second or something?" he retorted.

"IV, watch your language," V finally scolded, unable to suppress his disdain any longer.

Byron chuckled and interrupted, "I almost thought you actually did, IV."

V sighed, knowing that their father was trying to ease things for him and decided to put more effort on controlling himself. IV was just being his usual self, he shouldn't get too worked up on it lest he would give his brother the pleasure of playing right into his game.

"Right, father and I have talked about it and decided what kind of training that would suit you," V said after regaining his composure back.

"Pray, tell." The second Prince crossed his arms over his chest, waiting for the impending bomb. It wasn't the first time his brother had tried to pull the stunt but he was smarter at hedging it. The challenge was to find his way around it and although he found it to be rather bothersome, he still felt some sort of smug satisfaction from winning the unofficial game of wit.

"I think you should try taking the role as the King," the silver-haired King finally said, quick and without preamble.

"You're mad," IV replied instantly. He had expected some sort of trouble from his brother (of course, his definition of trouble differed greatly from that of his brother), but he had never expected _this_ kind of trouble. There was only so much reason they could appoint him as a King, and although he never cared about Palace business and such, didn't mean he never paid attention. He did pay attention just enough to make sure that nothing potentially troublesome coming his way anytime soon and he certainly hadn't seen this one coming.

"Why, I thought _service_ is your motto? It's basically the same thing with being a King, you serve yourself for the good of the whole kingdom," V remarked sarcastically.

"It's _fanservice_ ," IV corrected, scowling irritably. "And I only do that to those I deem suitable."

"Well, I deem you suitable enough to be King, so practice what you preach."

"You're just doing that out of desperation now, aren't you?"

"It's a well-discussed plan. I've even prepared whatever's going to be necessary to commence it if we have your agreement. I will act as regent, along with father, and you will be King in name only," V explained.

"Sounds like a last-minute discussion, I must say. I mean, you've only been King for like, what… not even five years?"

"I haven't finished explaining yet," V said again, glaring at his brother. "It's only temporary until I deem you fit to integrate into society as a decent human being."

IV rolled his eyes for the umpteenth time that day and held back a guffaw. It had become a habit for the two of them to insult one another whenever they had the chance. Since they were both the Princes, they weren't allowed to use cuss words when they were in the Palace or in front of public, so they both had to come up with something derogatory without having to throw curse—and he found it to be increasingly amusing from time to time.

"Temporary _how long_?" he asked.

"Until I make sure that you won't travel out there spreading bad names for our country."

The second Prince scoffed. "Please. It took like three days for the people from United Land of Poseidon to recognize me, and it was with their own Prince, no less. How would someone from across the ocean know my face? We're not that big of a country to begin with. Don't get your head too high."

"Oh, I was almost convinced that you'd walk down the street declaring your name like some pre-teen looking for attention."

"I'm 22, way past my pre-teen."

"Could've fooled me with the way you act."

"Alright, that's enough, you two. Can we please steer back to the topic, now?" Byron had to cut in again before the exchange turned dirty. V, he could trust with behaving himself, but not for IV.

"Wait, you said that 'until I won't travel out there…' and so on. Does that mean I'll be allowed to build ships and travel to wherever I want once I get this done?" IV asked again.

V raised his eyebrows, looking rather surprised that his brother did pay attention. "Of course you could. But first, you have to pass the evaluation I made. It would at least last two and a half year. Any longer than that is up to the result."

IV scowled again. "Two and a half? Are you trying to kill me or something?"

"I'm trying to get you learn some responsibilities."

Now it was the red-and-gold haired Prince's turn to exhale in exasperation. He tried to weigh down the options, if he had any at all. The last time he had tried to ask to build ships with some guards he was quite close with, they had refused, saying that there was no clearance from the higher-ups—meaning, the King himself. He couldn't even ask for help to just bring the materials he needed without permission from the King, and he couldn't just go out there with his horse alone—he wanted to explore the land across the ocean and for that, he needed a fine boat with fine provision. Now, his brother had offered that opportunity in a really difficult condition—at least for him.

"Can I have the boat built while I'm under this evaluation thing? Building an elaborate boat may take years, you know?" he tried to negotiate to his end.

"I don't see why not," Byron promptly replied, but then added, "Of course if your brother approves."

IV's hopeful smile immediately turned into frown in less than a second. Now, it was up to his brother. He always wondered why his father put that much trust to V just because he showed more promise than him. To his defense, he showed more promises in term of swordfight, hunting, military leadership, and such, more than his other brothers and he preferred his way to do things. If V approved of this arrangement, at least he had something to motivate him so that he could do well and—who knew—his brother might speed up the business. That didn't sound so bad, when he thought about the whole thing again.

"Travelling may do you good." V pondered, covering his mouth with a hand and considering the offer. "But for now, I'll have you travel only to take care of our country's affair using _our_ boat."

"Of course, dear brother. But does that mean I'll get a team building my boat soon?" he asked again, eyes sparkling with anticipation.

"Yes, you may," V finally agreed.

"Oh, yes, when will I start this evaluation thing and building the boat? And what'll I do once I started?" IV asked again, suddenly felt eager to get the deal done with—even though they hadn't even started.

At that, V and Byron looked at each other, then back to the second Prince before them and smiled amusedly.

"That, IV, is for you to figure out."

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 ** _Word Count_** _: 2,370_

 _Reviews are always welcome!_


	3. Chapter 3: III

**Chapter 3: III**

 ** _Disclaimer_** _: Of course I don't own YGO Zexal, heck, I don't even own the general concept of cheesy-romance flicks. So, shut up and just read if you want. XOXO_

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III skimmed through the pages like someone who hadn't eaten—or read, in his case—for a few days straight and was in desperate need of something that was informative, descriptive, and—most importantly—interesting.

The pink-haired boy was slow enough to memorize every detail that he deemed interesting or important, but quick enough to even put the champion of tongue-twister competition bowed their head before him. It had become sort of habit for him since he was getting busier with his share of Royal duties ever since his coming-of-age ceremony. The other two brothers did their share of work, of course, but would mostly spend their times debating which work each of them had to do and how.

The third Arclight Prince couldn't understand his brothers some times. They claimed to hate each other and declared each other to be polar opposites, but all he saw was two equally obstinate brothers that, not only shared the same eye's shape, but also shared the same lanky and tall stature, fine-boned cheeks, not to mention ridiculous level of stubbornness of their own.

If V was a spitting image of their father, IV was the combination of their father and mother, III was the spitting image of their mother—mostly, at least. He was the only one with curly hair, big eyes, round cheeks, and small stature for his age that made him appear younger than he should be most of the time. He would always be 'little brother' wherever he went, even when faced with someone who was actually younger than him. Maybe it was his appearance, or simply his personality. Unlike the oldest brother who was strict and condescending, or the other one who was unpredictable and rather brusque, he was meek and mild-mannered, seemingly weak but was actually quite cunning, and could hold himself up pretty well against the antics of his brothers.

Speaking of antics, his brothers were at it again, it seemed. It wasn't the first time IV was being called to the throne room. In fact, it had almost become a weekly basis of V's failed attempt after failed attempts at shoving responsibilities down IV's throat. This was one of the things he disagreed with his older brother. IV had his own pace at doing things, why bother trying to shove someone else's way?

Being a workaholic that V was, he was very meticulous at every single thing he did. He knew the best way to do almost everything that didn't involve IV. If he wanted things to be that way, it should be done that way too. Disagreement would only lead to never-ending debate until one of them grew tired with it—usually the opposing part. It just so happened that his way to do things was quite similar to his older brother, but not for IV. Unfortunately, IV had been immune to that and would never back down until they both forgot the thing at some point, before starting a new one and repeating the cycle all over again.

Of course, as he had mentioned before, the two brothers were basically spitting image of each other in term of being an absolute nightmare of obstinacy. None of them would back down in this unending tug-o-war and he was stuck in the middle of it; too tired to tell them to stop and decided to just stay away as much as he could by busying himself with voracious reading. He always liked reading ever since he was little, especially books about various civilization of some other lands across the ocean—one of few reasons he could understand IV's desire to travel the world and took his side most of the time. If IV managed to build the boat someday, he would really like to come.

That was one big if, though.

He was still wondering why had no one dubbed V as a dictator with the way he rule things so that even IV couldn't get his way around that easy. It only showed that he was that good at winning his people's heart and that he was really made for the job as the King. IV would be suited as their Chief Commander or something like that. He wondered what kind of job he would be suited to, since he couldn't see himself as the King; maybe a Royal Advisor or a Royal Priest? He had taken some interest in water divination like the people did in United Land of Poseidon Kingdom. If they could do that with water, maybe he could also do it with something else he was good at; old relic, perhaps?

The youngest Arclight prince was too busy musing over the possibilities of other type of divination and healing that he didn't hear the guard's voice saluting to someone coming down to the library. It was only when the newcomer passed the long desk he was seated at that he realized he wasn't alone anymore.

It was IV, looking prim and proper, which III took to be rather unusual. He knew his brother had just returned from a hunting trip, and he would usually take a long hot bath and slept for a day straight afterward, or being grounded by V for not taking the proper protocol of dispatching soldiers or something like that, so his presence in the library was already unusual in and on itself without him having to dress like he was about to attend something important.

"How was the trip, niisama?" III asked as he rose from his seat to approach his brother.

"It was great," IV replied automatically, didn't even spare a glance as he proceeded to make his way to the huge wooden desk sitting at one corner of the rather huge room. III himself was sitting in the long desk placed in the middle of the room, surrounded by alleys of bookshelves, books piled up, with one of it opened up, before him.

If he always found V to be disagreeable, he couldn't quite do that to his little brother. True, the two brothers would often start a fight over a little disagreement like anyone would, but his attitude was completely different with each brother. It might be because III had never judged his action, even when he was about to do something he admitted to be crazy, but that might also be caused of the younger boy's respect towards him. And such, he didn't have the heart to tell him to stay away whenever he was given advice or simply being asked with mundane questions.

"Oh, that's right. I was in the middle of reading a very interesting book here when V-niisama called you. I didn't know about that until one of the guards asked why I was still here. Anyway, what was that all about?"

"He's just trying to get me more responsible and all that stuff," IV answered, didn't take his attention away from the array of papyrus scroll piled up in the box on the table, as if trying to figure out which one he should pick up to read.

"Those are correspondences from other countries," III pointed out, finally deciding to find out what his brothers were up to.

"I know. I'm trying to figure out which one to start," he replied absently.

III blinked, as if unsure what his brother had said. For as long as he remembered, his brother never bothered himself with this kind of Royal duties since he had finished his education, so he hadn't seen this one coming for the time being. "Does this have something to do with what V-niisama called you for earlier?"

"More or less."

The pink-haired young man sat down on the chair in front of the desk, which was made of carved wood and looked rather nice but also stiff at the same time. It was one of the reasons he, IV as well, never liked sitting on it—even though he had every right to; and even being constantly reminded by the Head Librarian to sit there. But the chair was too big for him, and was too uncomfortable when he wanted to sit down and read books for hours to end, so he always preferred the common spaces since it'd be easier for him to go back and forth grabbing the books he wanted to read. IV himself was rarely seen around the library since his tutoring years ago and it was rather surprising that the first thing he did when he came here after a while was to reach the equally uncomfortable desk—even looked like he was unsure what to do with it.

III put his elbow on the smooth wooden surface and inquired curiously, "May I know what?"

IV sighed and sat down on an even bigger chair at the other side of the desk, propping his chin with a hand. "V wanted me to be King as soon as tomorrow. And I have to figure out myself what I should do once I am declared the King."

Again, III blinked. "King… as in the one who rule this country?"

"Well, if there's other definition of the word 'king', do tell me about it," IV scowled, wasn't in the mood of explaining things that were already obvious. He knew III was just confused just like he had been, and he couldn't blame him for it, but the disdain from his previous encounter with V still remained anyway.

"But, what about V-niisama then?"

"He'll be regent with father once I start ruling things."

"And you're fine with it, niisama?"

"Of course I'm not. He just offered me something that he knew I wouldn't pass up. So, yeah, I'll play along with it for as long as he need to."

The third Prince of the Arclight Kingdom gaped at his brother, then covered his mouth like he was suppressing something between a sniffle and a snicker. It was hard to decide, but knowing his own track record, he wouldn't put it past his supposedly-good-mannered little brother to laugh at his obvious discomfort. He knew it was them both being laughed at; him for having to deal with the strictest-King-alive and said King itself for having to resort to such thing to deal with him.

"I never thought the day that IV-niisama actually acts like a proper monarch would actually come…"

"I told you, it's just because I've been offered something nice. Just watch me in like two years or something, I'll have the boat ready and then I'll be gone to the end of horizon."

"But with V-niisama acting as regent, doesn't that mean you won't fully decide what's done or decided?"

"The boat was part of the agreement, as an incentive for me to put up a good performance in the given time," IV explained, smirking at the mention of his possible future.

"Oh, I think I get it. It's some sort of test for you, isn't it?" III clapped his hand once, finally pieced the puzzles together.

"Damn right, it is."

"Niisama," III reminded him of the use of language.

"Right, my bad. Do you have any idea what I'm supposed to do once I start?" IV asked, deciding that asking for III's help wouldn't hurt. He wasn't one to ask for help if he could do it himself, but he had pretty much zero idea on how to start the ruling things for he had never bothered himself with it for almost half a decade now. Besides, III wasn't the type to tell on him for even the stupidest thing he had done unless he was found out beforehand.

"If V-niisama acted as regent, you basically don't have to do anything. You just need to do what you were told to."

"What if he tried to test me by deliberately giving misleading suggestion?"

"We're talking about V-niisama here. That might be something you'd do under similar circumstance, but not V-niisama. He's too serious to even think about getting revenge by risking the whole country."

"Wouldn't put it past him, though, since, apparently, he was willing to do anything to make me do what he wanted."

"I get where you come from, niisama, but that's not how V-niisama works. There're lots of way to make you feel uncomfortable without having to put the entire country at risk, like, say, he'd give you hard times for not following his suggestions? It wasn't as if it was the first time he does that anyway."

IV frowned. "In other words, I have to be his puppet?"

III chuckled at the term. "Of course you get to have your say in several matters, but considering you don't have much experience in this field, I think it'd be safer just to play along in the beginning until you get the hang of things. We don't want V-niisama berates you just because you made some 'stupid' decision now, would we?"

"Oh, well, you do have a point. Is there anything else I need to watch out for?"

"Once you're the King, some topics that would arise includes rearranging the council, amending the law if necessary, corresponding with other countries—which basically means making a visit, marriage—"

"Out of question," IV interjected firmly.

"I'm just saying it might be brought up at some point, you don't have to agree or even take care of it, but I believe it'll have impact to your evaluation," III explained matter-of-factly.

IV shifted his head a little, burying his mouth deeper into his palm. "I'm starting to get the impression that V is trying to trap me into this thing. He knew I wouldn't be able to travel leaving all those burdens behind…" he scrunched his nose as the image of him as a King danced inside his mind.

"I believe that's partly his intention. You need to watch out for V-niisama. He's unbelievably strong and crafty for someone people believe to be gentle and trustworthy."

"Crafty, I know. But I'm stronger than him in term of swordfight or even bare-handed fight, period."

"Being adept in a fight isn't all about strength, niisama. You should've seen him wipe the floor with the guards in one training session while you were away."

"Are you really on my side or what?"

"I'm telling you this for your own good, niisama. You know that you're going to be watched, so you need to put up your best performance in any given field."

IV's magenta eyes glanced at his brother—who looked rather serious. "I hate it when you always have your point."

"Thank you. Now, you just need to practice what we've been drilled in our lessons, especially in terms of keeping your appearances and manner, and you should be fine."

"No, I'm good at that. What I dread the most is the fact that I have to interact more with you-know-who," IV grumbled, releasing his chin and sat up straight. "I guess I'll start with the correspondence thing."

"That's the spirit, niisama!"

"That's just an excuse to get me out of here. I need some times to sort things out without V hovering around like a specter. Besides, it's about time I go visit some old friends."

"Oh, right. What about the coronation?"

IV started to take out the letters from the box and skimming through the contents of each one disinterestedly. "There won't be any coronation. Just a Royal Decree from Your Majesty the King, and then I'll jump into the hades myself."

"I'm feeling excited somehow."

"Maybe V will do yours once he's done with mine."

"But you'll be gone once you're done with this, right?" III asked again, pouting a little.

"You can come with me if you want."

"I'm not sure I want to leave all these behind. Mikki might need some company, too."

"I'm sure V and Akari will give her 'company' anytime soon. He'll have a plenty of free time after this thing started."

The pink-haired young Prince chuckled softly. "With the way you handle this King business, niisama, I'm pretty sure V-niisama will have the hardest first few months as regent ever."

* * *

 ** _Word Count_** _: 2,684_

 ** _A/N_** _By the way, I wasn't the one coming up with V-Aka ship along with their cute daughter, Mikki. I found them in a forum discussing AU where Zexal casts are involved in the event happened in Arc-V, namely the Destruction of Heartland. It's set a few years after Zexal timeline, so a lot of them have grown up. I_ might _write about it someday… ahem… Reviews are always welcome!_


	4. Chapter 4: Rio

**Chapter 4: Rio**

 ** _Disclaimer_** _: Of course I don't own YGO Zexal,_ _heck, I don't even own the general concept of cheesy-romance flick. So, shut up and just read if you want. XOXO_

* * *

Rio sighed for the umpteenth times that day, looking out one of her room's windows from her favorite window seat, huddling with pillows in various size and shape around her. It was rather hot today, with occasional breeze blowing her light and dark blue tresses softly, and she had kind of wished it would rain soon to match her current somber mood. Even with the windows open, she still felt like trapped in a birdcage with no way out.

She might as well be, remembering what she had gotten herself into the other day.

Ryouga was right. She should have acted like normal girls and shut her mouth up for good. Now she was paying the price. Even with Ryouga trying with all his might to nullify the unintentional agreement, there was only so much they could do with their position right now.

With recent disaster from a tsunami, one of their lands was in a wreck, added with the current conflict with the neighboring country over some small islands lying between their kingdom's borders. When they tried to negotiate with the opposing part to save the country; that was when things went even more disastrous. Now they have to rebuild the wrecked island and to gather as many help as they could get. The help did come, but with the price that wasn't exactly fair—at least for her.

Well, at least she was making herself useful this time, there was no need to be this contrite, she tried to tell herself that many times.

But she did, anyway. What waited her ahead was nothing to look forward to. At this rate, she'd do _anything_ just to be free from this fate—as long as it wasn't any worse than it already was. But again, she was already too tired to do anything more than making a few loose snide remarks; couldn't even put her mind into her study too, so she spent most of her time looking up, yearning to be as free as the bird flying outside her window while counting down as the days grew nearer.

There was a resounding of familiar laughter down somewhere from across the garden. She looked down to Ryouga's study, which was located two floors down and across from her room, but couldn't see what was happening inside. She remembered that Ryouga was greeting some guest from other country, what was his name again? Something weird and easy to pronounce.

That wasn't what bothered her, though. How could her brother be laughing at a time like this? She knew she was being unreasonable, but she felt like she had means to justify her attitude. She wouldn't be here that much longer anyway and she would spend every last second of it harassing her brother to hell and back before her turn came.

Rio stepped down from her seat, didn't bother to slip into shoes as she made her way out of her room, down to the corridors to reach Ryouga's study. Some of the servants looked surprised when she greeted them as she walked down the flight of stairs down, but she was already used to it by now. As she got nearer to said room, she immediately recognized the other voice, and without knocking, she pushed the door open.

"Hello, Mr. Anonymous."

.

.

.

"Come on. It couldn't be that bad," Ryouga commented, laughing a little at the end of his sentence. "I mean, we're both King, now. That'll make our business go smoother. Showing that you have good term with the neighboring kingdom is one way to prove that you're a capable leader."

"Ha, you think it's funny?" IV scowled, seating himself on the window seat and leaned his back to the wall. "My brother thinks it's funny too, 'wouldn't want to spoil the fun now, do we?'" he mimicked what V had said to him a few days earlier.

The United Land of Poseidon Ocean was the closest kingdom to the Arclight's, located just 2 days horse-ride away down the mountains and hill and a few hours of boat ride to reach the main land. It was a kingdom known for its vast sea territory and water divination. Its area consisted of several islands connected with each other; the castle located in the main land among those islands. Since a year ago, it was ruled by a young King, Ryouga, with his councilor acted as regent. IV had come to this land more than once already, with the first one being after his coming-of-age. He had tried to sneak into their boat to run away from his country but had been found out by then-15-year-old Prince Ryouga after a certain accident. Although he dreaded the fact that he had failed to sneak through undetected, the two became sort of friends ever since and he would always use the excuse to 'maintain good relationship with neighboring country' to come visit—while, in fact, it was the closest thing he could get with running away from his supposed duties.

"I can't blame your brother, though. Being a King is though, even in name only." Ryouga paused, then added, "Or, maybe because it was in name only. It's a lot harder since we have to act like we know things we actually don't."

"Aren't we all?"

Ryouga snorted from his seat by the desk while turning the chair to face the young man sitting on the window seat behind him. "Of course you'd know. You're good at it, after all."

"Don't even joke. I was ready to rip the ' _Royal Advisor_ ' to shred just by talking with him. No wonder they got nothing done, they spent all their time thinking what fancy words they would spew next."

At that, Ryouga guffawed. "I believe now it's high time you practice that fanservice nonsense of yours!"

"Come on! One smug brother is enough!"

"No, I'd make sure you have a very good time in your reign."

IV grinned "Challenge accepted."

The purple-haired young King was just about to retort when the door of his study flew open, followed by a voice that spoke, "Hello, Mr. Anonymous."

Rio walked into the room, her long dress flowing softly around her ankle as her hair draped messily behind her back—lacking its usual white hood that she almost always wore. She was also barefoot, which only made her appearance even more strikingly odd, especially to IV, who had only seen her in her best clothes and appearance.

"Rio? What are you doing?" Ryouga asked at the sight of his twin sister as he jolted up from his seat, looking surprised at the sudden intrusion. Rio didn't usually wander around, especially not when she had nothing to do in particular and even looking like she had just gotten out of bed. But with the way she behaved lately, though, he didn't know what to expect in this kind of situation.

"Why? Am I interrupting something?"

"I'm not anonymous anymore, how many times should I tell you that?" IV cut in, lips twisting into a small scowl. It wasn't that he disliked the blunette, he barely spoke with the girl in the first place. But after their first encounter years ago (and the fiasco that followed), it had been her who had reported him to Ryouga and caused him to get caught by his brother. To be perfectly honest; he still held a little grudge to the girl—just a little since he knew it wasn't entirely her fault to begin with.

"So, what pleasure did Ryouga owe for your visit?" she asked, ignoring her brother's question.

"None of your goddamn business."

Rio waved her index finger at him. "That's no way for a Royal Prince to talk."

"Newsflash, I'm the King of Arclight Kingdom now. So I can do whatever I like, thank you very much."

Rio lifted an eyebrow. "I'm sorry then, Your Majesty. Whatever happened to that austere brother of yours? Finally realizing that you're way more capable of charming your people?"

This time, it was IV's turn to lift his eyebrows. "I have to agree about the part that my brother is morbidly stern… too stern that he couldn't get a girl without having to get betrothed first. But about the second part… honestly, you two, brother and sister, has a really dry sense of humor."

"You're one to talk. Say, do girls flock around you now that you're King? Must be hard for you then?"

IV huffed indignantly. "As a matter of fact, girls do flock around me for my charms, even before this."

"It won't be long before they brand you as heart-breaker King."

"Alright, that's enough. What are you doing here, Rio? Don't you have something more important to do?" Ryouga finally interrupted after being ignored for quite some times.

The blue-haired Princess of United Land of Poseidon turned to her brother and replied, "I've scratched another line to my countdown, if that's what you mean by 'something more important to do'."

Ryouga clamped down at that, and IV didn't miss the reaction but said nothing, letting the situation to unfold itself. Rio put a hand on her hip and continued, "Speaking of important. You're the one who have loads of responsibilities instead of socializing with this sorry excuse of a King."

"Hey! What's your problem, wench?" IV snapped, couldn't hold his ever inflating disdain towards the girl, now that he knew she did that on purpose.

She shrugged and replied, "Looking for fun, I guess?"

"Go get your fun somewhere else. Your brother and I have real business to discuss. You won't be able to comprehend it anyway," IV retorted sharply, which earned Rio's pout as the two engaged in a staring contest; magenta orbs against a pair of similar one.

After a few seconds, she began to stalk off with a huff. "I'll be busying myself in my room, then. I believe it'll be _important_ once I'm gone from here." With that, she slammed the door shut, leaving the two young men looked bewildered for different reasons.

"What's gotten into her?" IV asked after the sound of her footsteps receded into background, signaling that she was getting far away from the room.

"Vector disease?" Ryouga sighed tiredly. "She's been acting like that since that agreement."

The young King of Arclight Kingdom furrowed his eyebrows. "What disease? What agreement?"

"You know the King of Vector Kingdom? The one with land full of diamond mines?"

IV pondered for a moment before answering, "I think I've heard the name once or twice before, but never actually met the person. What about him?"

"She's going to be married off to him. It has not yet been announced, but everything had already been planned—more or less. She's going to live there starting next month to be given proper education before eventually marrying him."

IV's magenta eyes grew bigger that it almost popped out of his socket. "Okay… how and when did that happen, and why haven't you killed the bastard yet?"

It was Ryouga's turn to scowl. "I'm not that brash."

The red-and-gold haired young man rolled his eyes. "Sure. You only intended to kill some stranger just because you thought that stranger might have done something perverted to your sister while, in fact, said stranger had saved her life."

"It wasn't my fault she said that you were running away when she tried to heal you," the younger man reasoned. "I thought you were wounded because she hit you when you tried to make a pass at her."

"A very sound conclusion, indeed."

"We were fifteen at that time—"

"That makes her 19 now, and she's about to be married with someone with not-so-good reputation. It's a wonder you haven't declared war on them," IV cut the purple-haired young man short, steering their conversation back to the main topic.

"You don't even know the guy. How would you know he has not-so-good reputation?" retorted Ryouga.

"Just because I don't care doesn't mean I don't pay attention. You should've seen your own face when you mention that guy. I thought I've seen something similar in the kitchen… dried prune or something? Besides, you wouldn't ask back if that's not true," IV elaborated matter-of-factly.

"Fine!" Ryouga snapped in the end, throwing both hands to the air. "You win. I'll explain everything to you if you would just shut up."

IV smiled smugly but said nothing, keeping their one-sided agreement true. Ryouga sat back down on his chair and turning it around to face his desk while grumbling, "Just let me get these papers done, then we'll get some lunch and talk about politics."

* * *

 ** _Word Count_** _: 2,111_

 _ **A/N** I think it's only fair that Rio gets chapter 4. She's about to be paired with IV, after all :p I know it's a bit late update, but I kept rewriting parts of the story to make it linear with the new plot_


	5. Chapter 5: Proposal (1)

**Chapter 5: Proposal (1)**

 _ **Disclaimer** : Of course I don't own YGO Zexal, heck, I don't even own the general concept of cheesy-romance flick. So, shut up and just read if you want. XOXO_

 _ **Author's Note** : If you've read that Rio is getting engaged to 'the King of Vector Kingdom' in the previous chapter, do mind that I have never said it was Vector (Rei); it's just the Kingdom's name. Of course, Rei (Vector) is still affiliated with that 'Vector Kingdom', but he's not King—not yet anyway. You'll have to wait a bit later 'til that issue being brought up in the future (probably :p), for the time being, RIO IS BEING BETROTHED TO 'KING OF VECTOR KINGDOM', NOT VECTOR (REI) himself. This chapter will further explain it, so start reading! Shoo!_

* * *

 _THUMP!_

The sound echoed throughout the night. Just a little more than a two months ago, it would have alerted those living in the quarters around it—mostly servants. But now, it had become almost nightly occurrence after Princess Rio showed up unannounced at the soldier training ground one afternoon, surprising her twin brother, the King, and other soldiers when she asked to borrow a target practice for barehanded fight. Ryouga had demanded explanation at the time, but she said nothing and disappeared with the rather heavy sandbag—which also baffled those who looked at the spectacle. It wasn't until midnight that the fate of the poor sandbag was discovered.

The servants—who had woken up at the sound of blunt clashing—thought that there was someone trying to sneak into the castle only to find out that Rio was using the missing sandbag as her midnight target practice. Some of them, including Ryouga, had asked why she did that, but then clamped down at her death glare, and no one ever interrupted or asked anything else after that.

 _THUMP!_

It had hurt at first as she hadn't used to such display of brute force, but it gave her some sense of satisfaction for being able to vent her frustration. After a week, she regretted she hadn't started it as soon as she had gotten her marching order.

The initial agreement hadn't been all that bad; just the usual marriage by politic cause, if not for the fact that she was going to be married to someone who was old enough to be her father and the man was such an unlikeable individual. She could stand men being stupid as it was practically what she had grown up with right by her side. But, later on, she found out that that was different level of stupidity, or probably even madness. Sure, their country was prospering with all those diamond mines scattered across their land, and that they had far stronger army than most Kingdom, but did they have to boast that much? She didn't even know a human—men in particular—could be that vain.

That was the first time she had regretted her behavior on that fateful night, when the offhanded remarks had left her lips and soon led to the disastrous agreement. Being vindictive that she was, she tried to make most of her time interacting with the envoy from Vector Kingdom (apparently, the King himself refused to set foot on the recently attacked kingdom for fear of his life) to be as painful as it could be for the middle-aged man.

It had been fun, at first, seeing the poor guy squirming under her snarky remarks until the man mentioned that she was being 'unladylike' and therefore needed to be educated properly in their land. From there on, everything plunged into hades for her. For someone from a self-absorbed Kingdom, they showed proficiencies at playing the political game that even she, the chess-master, had been taken off-guard. She had utterly underestimated those guys, and now there were even bigger price to pay. No more moves to play, so, now, she directed those angers at her brother and the poor sandbag she had been punching and kicking for the last two months. Sometimes, she would use a wooden stick—which was usually used as sword-replacement in soldier's training—to hit the bag. If she had started this sooner, she wouldn't have been too harsh on the envoy and the agreement wouldn't be all that bad.

But, well, it was already too late to mull over things now. The damage had been done, and they had to mend what they could.

This night was no different than her recent routines; surrounded by shrubberies in one of the Palace's Gardens, the sound of crickets echoed in the air, while the moon perched high on the dark sky, pouring silver light on her sweat-drenched body. She was breathing rather heavily from her recent exertion and didn't hear the creaking sound of windows being pushed open until the one opening it called out.

"Are you planning to beat that poor King to death or something?"

Now, the voice was what different tonight. No one had bothered her in the last few days, especially not relative stranger.

"Enjoying the view, Mr. Anonymous?" she said, turning her head to the direction of the voice. "You know he's not _poor_. How long have you been watching?"

IV was leaning out of the window, one hand balled to prop his smirking face while the other rested lazily on the frame. "Long enough to see that you have a really mean right hook, I'll give you that," he remarked, chuckling at the end of the sentence.

"Thanks, but no, thanks. What are you doing sneaking around in the middle of the night at a castle that isn't even yours?" she asked straight to the topic. He was still wearing the same clothes he wore earlier that day, which meant he never intended to go to sleep and, instead, snuck around to see if whatever Ryouga had told him to be true.

"What are _you_ doing punching the sandbag in the middle of the night? It doesn't even look remotely similar to that old geezer. The least you could do is to write his name across it to make it even more satisfying."

"None of your goddamn business." She turned back to the sandbag before her and started punching lightly.

The red-and-gold haired young man scoffed. "Now I see why Ryouga said you've gone crazy. And my brother thought I always screw things _royally_." He shook his head slightly. "He clearly didn't know what he was talking about."

"Oh, I believe you will. Soon enough anyway, now that you're King of that bunch of cavemen," she shot back coldly.

"Ouch, you wound my pride, girl," IV said in a mock hurt.

Rio rolled her eyes. "Get over yourself. You have none to begin with."

"Savage," he murmured, ignoring her glare as he continued, "If you have to choose between caveman and a madman to marry, which one you'll pick?"

"Neither."

"Your life depends on it, oh, wait, your _people_ 's life depends on it."

The blunette stopped briefly, staring at the young King with raised eyebrows. "What kind of question is that?"

IV shrugged and replied, "Just curious."

Silent for a few moments as Rio continued banging her fist to the punching bag. IV watched her all the while, looking slightly amused. Ryouga had told him all about what had happened between United Land of Poseidon Ocean and Vector Kingdom. He knew that she had penchant for snarky humor, but hadn't known that said humor would actually lead to a rather disastrous agreement—as Ryouga had told him.

Knowing both siblings, he felt rather odd seeing those two put up less fight against the matter, and although he had just seen that the girl had a lot of pride, she swallowed all of it for the sake of her people. From what he had heard, it was the girl's fault anyway, so it was only fair that she had to clean up the mess she had made.

What if it was him in such position? It didn't necessarily have to be marriage problem, but there were practically countless problems politic could cause when it was met with his incompetence if he didn't tread carefully—she was only one of the examples he witnessed up close and he wasn't sure if he wanted to know how things could go any worse from there. He would probably destroy the whole kingdom out of frustration.

Beside the newfound respect to Ryouga for taking the role as King at such a young age, he also started to think of any way he could avoid such situation. A small part of his brain whispered to him to just do what V suggested him or, God forbid, fully comply with his way of doing things. As much as he didn't want to admit it, he knew his brother was almost always right. But there were also that other part of his brain that told him to defy anyone who tried to control him; to prove that he was his own man and capable of making decisions for himself. Although, often times, desire to be acknowledged overlapped with childish impulse to just deviate for fun's sake, and his biggest problem was the inability to properly distinguish between the two and often clouded his judgment.

Once again, V was right calling him a pre-teen with his mental state right now. He knew that, his family knew that, and all of his life had been a massive pile of daredevil after another. The trick was to keep his boasting and appearance linear and so far, he had been able to live up to people's expectation. But now that his stakes were a bit higher, he had to tread with great care. There was no doubt that his brother would make his time as the King as strict as possible. Years of playing chess against his brother had taught him that there was no stopping the oldest Arclight once he was serious about something unless someone managed to throw him off guard. Being the model student that his brother was, he virtually had no weakness, but he also had spent years hedging and ignoring his brother's attempts and this 'trial' was no different. All he needed to do was to find something that would throw his brother off guard.

"It's probably not as much as that Vector King, but my country could still donate a large sum to help your country," he started carefully.

"I know what you're getting at, and Ryouga suggested something along that line too, but that's not how politic works," she replied without missing a beat of her punches. "At least know that you're on the same level with Ryouga, who has ruled this Kingdom for a little more than a year now. Pretty good for someone who has just been king for several days."

"I haven't finished talking yet, woman. Although thank you very much for your lame attempt at compliment," he shot back, started to feel annoyed at the girl's attitude. For a fragment of second, he wondered if he also sounded like that when he was feeling particularly snappish towards his brother. Oh, well, it wasn't the time to think about such thing.

"The law allows me to donate as many as I want to a close-knit country, in-laws, for example."

"You sure did your homework properly," she commented without looking away from her sandbag, sarcasm dripping from her tone.

"Especially to wife," IV finished his sentence despite his annoyance.

This time, she did stop punching and turned to look at him with furrowed eyebrows. "Again, it doesn't work like that. You can't just show up out of nowhere and declare that you're going to take someone else's fiancée as your wife to help rebuild their country. No, they'll stone you to death."

"Pretty nice way of explaining the whole scenario. But you're not yet his fiancée—unless you're really keen on being one immediately," he commented, earning another eye-roll from her. "And you're missing one important detail."

Rio rolled her eyes again and said, "That you're a King of a lot more barbaric country than Vector Kingdom, perhaps?"

He chuckled at her response. "Keep that mouth running and you'll lost your only way out."

"Right, this, I got to hear," she sneered, faking enthusiasm.

Again, it took a lot out of him to ignore her sarcasm. "There has to be love between us for this to work properly, you know?"

She stared at him incredulously for a few seconds before saying, "Either you're very stupid or crazy or both."

"Pretty sure that applied to you as well after that fiancée fiasco. Why, we could be stupid and crazy couple, even!" he retorted.

"You better shut up now before one of these fists landed on your sorry face." Rio balled her fists as to make her point clear.

IV raised both hands to the air, chuckling all the while. "My brother is the only one who could intimidate me with his presence alone. But if that means you'll listen to my stupid and crazy idea, fine, then."

"Really? You want to try to explain said stupid and crazy idea to Ryouga? I'm pretty sure he did try to kill you once or twice already with barely any reason. Just imagine if you're _shoving_ the reason itself down his throat."

"Hiding behind big brother now, huh?"

"Okay, that's it! You're dead here and now!" she started to approach him with exaggerated steps, magenta orbs flared with anger.

IV, seeing the girl was serious, started to turn back only to be met with Ryouga's figure standing under the shadowed hallway just a few feet away from him, blue eyes glinting even sharper than knife under the moonlight shone through the windows.

"What are you doing with my sister at a time like this?"

* * *

 _ **Word Count** : 2,178_

 _ **A/N** I intended to write the whole thing as one chapter, but the momentum might be lost that way, so let's split the bloody thing! :p_


	6. Chapter 6: Proposal (2)

**Chapter 6: Proposal (2)**

 ** _Disclaimer_** _: Of course I don't own YGO Zexal,_ _heck, I don't even own the general concept of cheesy-romance flick. So, shut up and just read if you want. XOXO_

* * *

Ryouga had never considered himself to be a sister-complex.

Rio was his twin, and it was only natural to look after your own siblings regardless their gender. In his defense, IV would also, at times, being protective towards his younger brother, and no one had called him brother-complex. He did admit that he would be overly protective towards her at times, even more than that of their parents, and Rio herself had expressed annoyance towards his overprotectiveness more than once already. But as they grew older together, the numbers of weirdos who tried to approach her seemed to increase.

Speaking of weirdos, he also got his fair share of female—sometimes even male—admirer who couldn't just leave him alone whenever he was out in public. But as the heir of the throne and, recently, the King himself, no one dared to even get close to him outside work capacity. Even if they did, his royal guards would be ready at his beck and call should something harmful came his way. Not that he couldn't defend himself, but it was a lot easier dismissing the insignificant ones to save energy for the _genuine_ threats.

For Rio, though, he couldn't actually determine what kind of threat deemed to be dangerous for her. And although he also knew that she was more than capable of defending herself when needed, that still didn't make him any less anxious. Moreover, the variety of the type of men who usually tried to approach her never ceased to amaze—as well as disgust—him. Some of them were fairly decent, ones who he'd take into consideration more than once (didn't mean he'd cut them some slack, though), but the rests were baffling to him. He wondered if that was how they always been or it was the effect of being lovestruck? If it was the latter, he wouldn't want himself to be caught off in such state even if it meant he'd stay bachelor his entire life.

The only problem was their statuses. As the Prince and Princess of United Land of Poseidon, such thing got even more unavoidable as they grew older. There were these rules and that custom, all those things drilled into his head. No matter how he found them to be troublesome most of the times, he couldn't deny that it brought orders to their kingdom. Waving them away carelessly would only result to nationwide unrest and, even though he was reluctant to admit but, he was not yet ready to take on such risk—not with their recent condition.

"I'll be fine," she'd say from time to time, even after he had found out about her midnight routine that clearly showed she was anything but—not to mention her behavior as of late, which only got severe as the time drew closer.

She looked and acted like she could take care whatever coming her way, and he had always believed she could. But apparently, not much this time—especially not with _him_.

If the guy wasn't a King, he'd have killed him already, just like IV had said. The man was old enough to be his father, and he couldn't stomach the idea of his sister playing husband and wife with him—who knew what he'd do to her while he wasn't looking? No, the thought alone was beyond his scariest nightmare.

Then IV came forward with his so-called brilliant idea, and he started to wonder if any guy who tried to approach his sister would look like that in his eyes. No, there had been times when he still considered some of them to be almost worthy, but apparently not after the Vector fiasco. His overprotectiveness shot up even higher and he couldn't let his guard down, even to a friend.

"If you don't want to, a simple 'no, thanks,' would suffice, OW!" IV grumbled, moaned in pain at the end when a wet cloth brushed his bruised temple. "If it wasn't me, you'd probably end up killing someone."

"Get over yourself, Mr. Death Wish. You're not that strong. What didn't kill you probably could only kill a guinea pig," Rio shot back, brushing the cloth to the bruise none too gently on purpose.

"Do you have to call me names, or you don't even remember the real one?"

The blue-haired girl raised her eyebrows and said, "You're saying IV is your real name? No wonder you have a really terrible sense of humor with such name—you and your brothers alike."

"Said someone whose morbid sense of humor screwed her royally," he retorted, which caused her to push the cloth harsher, earning another pained yelp from him. "Hey! Cut it out!"

"You're whining worse than a wench!" she snapped, throwing the cloth away and stormed out of the room.

"I know I'm irresistible that way!" he shouted to her disappearing back.

"Yes, irresistible to be punched, smacked, creamed, whatever works to kick some sense into your brainless head," Ryouga scowled from his seat across the room. They were in the spare room prepared for his visit this time, and out of guilt, both siblings opted to stay until he regained his consciousness back after they dragged his unconscious form here.

"I'm new to this politic stuff. Cut me some slack, will you?" IV said, grabbing the fallen cloth and started dabbing it himself. It was near noon, a few good hours after both siblings delivered him the fatal blows that knocked him out up until the last few minutes.

He admitted that he had spewed some nonsense back then, but he had never expected such show of violence. Sure, he had caught her punching the sandbag like some mad woman, but hadn't actually expected that she could hit _real_ people with her dainty hands. She did apologize and even offered to heal him, but then he had to comment, "Brings back memories, huh?" And after that, the exchange only turned even snarkier.

"Yeah? Watch your mouth next time you talk politics. You'd end up like…" he stopped, realizing something and said, "You'd screw things up far quicker."

IV raised his eyebrows at him but said nothing about it. He, instead, murmured, "I don't need every single one of you reminding me about how incompetent I am so far. I'm way too self-conscious already."

"The Great IV is now feeling insecure! Maybe I should come to your place some other times. It'd be really interesting to watch." Ryouga chuckled at the end of his sentence.

"Are we going at it again? Because I can still kick your sorry backside in training ground right now."

The purple-haired young King smirked. "Is that a challenge?"

.

.

.

Rio had never cried ever since she was old enough to sleep alone in her room. She had found out that with her position as a Royal Princess, many would take advantage of her and she wouldn't let herself be used that easily and she would not be a burden to anyone. So she put up her cool demeanor most of the times, even to Ryouga. Ever since she was old enough to be able to write, she had had her own set of training and lectures that consisted mostly of art, divination, and healing, but she also secretly learning whatever was given to her brother like swordsmanship, chess, even horse-riding under the pretense of accompanying and giving her brother support.

And now, she was more than ready to kill anyone who dared to threaten her family, including those people who kept belittling her then-grief-stricken kingdom. She only shot one snide remarks and they had to take her seriously. She would have laughed at their dimwittedness for losing the point of the sarcasm if not for the fact that they were taking it way _too_ _seriously_.

The King of the Vector Kingdom (she couldn't remember his name and never bothered to) was pretty good looking for his age—even she couldn't deny the fact—and they were rich, on top of that, but there was no way she'd give herself willingly to someone who treated woman like they were merely toys. But again, there was nothing she could do other than waiting for the inevitable. At least their people would have their town rebuilt faster now.

No, that reasoning was getting old and if she had to keep up the façade any longer than she already had, she might end up destroying more than she tried to salvage. It was all because of his _visit_. Didn't his brother, the silver-haired one, often say that he was a troublemaker? Getting involved with him would always mean trouble; even their first encounter wasn't one she would call amicable. True, he had saved her from an assassination attempt, but that had been the start of his friendship with Ryouga. If they weren't friend, he wouldn't have come here this day and throwing insensible comments every here and there without care, and she wouldn't feel all too aware of her situation.

At this point, she was willing to blame anything to anyone. She'd even blame the servants for serving food and attending for their 'honored' guest. Oh, and Ryouga was on top on her list for frolicking around with said guest. Nobody seemed to care about her and she wondered if screaming her lungs out in the training ground would be overkill.

 _The hell with that_ , she thought as she started to make her way towards the training ground. The soldier's training usually started after lunch, so it was supposed to be empty. But, as she got closer, she could hear familiar clanking sound of wooden stick against each other, followed by the familiar voices she had been trying to avoid.

She walked through the open hallway overlooking the training ground and there they were; exchanging wooden stick and laughing like there was nothing wrong. She envied them—so much that the air around her grew warmer the longer she looked at them. The vindictive part of her brain screamed for her to get between them, to screw things worse until Ryouga couldn't bear it anymore. They were twin, after all, so they both had to feel each other's pain, they said.

"Care to join us?"

She was snapped from her train of thought with his voice. The two of them had stopped fighting now and was looking at her with raised eyebrows.

"Can I?" she asked back, sounding a bit too eager than even she had anticipated.

"No, you're not joining us," Ryouga answered, looking slightly annoyed that his sister had yet again interrupted them.

"She could answer the question herself."

"I'll go easy on you two. Promise," she said sweetly as she moved closer to the two.

IV whistled. "I don't know about your brother, but I never back down from a challenge."

"Come on! Can't I have some free time to relax in between your and that Advisor's nagging?" Ryouga protested.

"I'm just going to borrow him for a few minutes, no need to be an irate fishwife."

"You're an irate fishwife. I have to deal with your crap while you're waltzing here and there, making things worse than they already are!"

The blunette looked at her brother incredulously, mouth opened and closed, surprised that he finally addressed the unspeakable straight to her face. They had had rows over the subject that was more like crotchety cold war where they discussed the thing with apparent disgust coupled with a few snarky intermissions. She wasn't really keen on throwing tantrums like some spoiled child (although she had wanted it a few times over) and had always been trying to keep her temper in check. Ryouga seemed to agree with the unspoken rule of their cold war and never once blew up. But now, they both, apparently, had reached the end of their patience.

"Making things worse? You're not the one getting married to mister oh-heck-I'm-going-to-marry-you-because-I-have-too-much-money-and-you-don't-look-half-bad-either! How is that supposed to get any worse?"

"Serves you right, now!"

"Uh, I'm still right here…?" IV cut in, watching the situation unravel itself half-amused, half-annoyed that he was being ignored.

"You stay out of it!" Ryouga snapped without turning his eyes from glaring contest with his twin.

"No, no, no. You know what? He has every right to know how crap of a leader you are!" she refuted almost instantly, pointing fingers at her twin. "Or, better yet, you should start getting along with your soon-to-be brother-in-law!"

* * *

 ** _Word Count_** _: 2,078_

 ** _A/N_** _So, that's another chapter. I had so much fun writing their interaction :p. Reviews are always welcome!_


	7. Chapter 7: Proposal (3)

**Chapter 7: Proposal (3)**

 ** _Disclaimer_** _: Of course I don't own YGO Zexal, heck, I don't even own the general concept of cheesy-romance flick. So, shut up and just read if you want. XOXO_

* * *

Despite being confident most of the time, IV wouldn't deny that he had tons of anxiety lacing his mind for every choice he made. He had never showed it, of course, but that never stopped the telltale sign of anxiety attack invading his body; sweat rolling down his nape, constricted throat, racing heartbeat, everything that would render him miserable if he decided to show it all on his face. Of course, as a well-trained charmer—as Ryouga liked to put it—it had become sort of habit to automatically hide all those vulnerabilities from his appearance. But again, he still felt the pressure anyway—especially before Ryouga in this particular moment.

The young king of United Land of Poseidon was and always been his best friend since they knew each other. His brothers would some time joke that they were as thick as thieves and fought like an old married couple. There had never been any real animosity between them—save for their first encounter—but friendly banters. As such, they never got intimidated by each other's presence no matter how much they throw cocky remarks every now and then.

This time, however, he had to take back the very remark he had said to Rio the day before. He was, currently, feeling extremely, overwhelmingly, and absolutely terrified of Ryouga. He had his fair share of facing dangerous characters who tried to harm or even kill him during his various adventures up until now, but not one of them emitted murderous aura as thick as the purple-haired young man before him. If looks could kill, he might have been a lifeless heap of flesh mangled simply by the unknown force from Ryouga's unrelenting glare.

The red-and-gold haired young man had wanted to say something to diffuse the situation, but his throat clenched too tight that he even had a hard time breathing evenly. By his side, the blue-haired girl looked perfectly fine—smug, even—like she didn't even realize there was tension hung in the air. He knew she wasn't that dense to not feel it too, how come she acted so calm?

He had to do something before it went out of hand. The girl seemed like she was just blurting out things just to contradict her brother, and although he could relate to that, this wasn't the right time to be vindictive—even he could tell that. After a few more moments of silence, he could finally muster, "Rio…I think—"

"Shut up or I'm going to rip your throat so you'll stop talking nonsense," Ryouga said calmly, which clashed horribly with his countenance towards the red-and-gold haired King.

"Is that a way to speak with your brother-in-law?" Rio said snidely, crossing her arms over her chest.

"He's NOT my brother-in-law, and will never be," Ryouga glared at his twin, emanating less murderous aura than he did to IV, but still prominent anyway.

"Oh, I didn't know you like that old geezer that much that you prefer him over your best friend here?"

"This and that are different matters."

"Let me give you something, if this sorry-face did something to me, you could torture him all you like without having to worry about war with neighboring country. That's good enough deal for me."

"We have not yet talked about the specification of our deal," IV cut in, finally found the strength to speak up his mind. It had been his idea, of course, to court her for the sake of their benefits, and he had thought it was a brilliant idea. Now, that was one more remark to take back.

Rio turned her head at his direction and smiled sweetly. "Don't worry. I'll arrange things for you. I'm good at it, you know?"

"For once in a lifetime, Rio, shut your mouth for good before you make things worse for both of us!" Ryouga finally snapped.

"Oh, come on, Ryouga, What do you know about worse? I'm the one that geezer leers at like I'm one of his nude paintings. We've gone over this forever, and I'm sick of hearing you trying to control my life!"

"And look what you've done! You've boasted you'll take two unworthy men as your husband, and I have to clean up the mess you made!"

"Unworthy or not is not for you to decide." Then, she hooked her arms to the young man by her side. "Now, if you'll excuse us, we're going to have a lover's talk to discuss the juicy details about our newfound relationship. Good day to you, dear brother."

The purple-haired young King looked scandalized, but Rio had stormed out of the training ground with IV in tow before he could voice his protest. When her words were finally registered in his brain, his sister had been gone and he was left in the middle of the open space, dumbfounded.

.

.

.

"You're crazy, woman," IV said as Rio dragged him along the hallway. There was so much happened in the span of mere two hours that he found himself in a flurry of mixed emotions; flabbergasted, awe, fear, among other things.

"I'm flattered. Now, which one do you prefer; my drawing room or the balcony?"

"Balcony, please. Ryouga would flay me alive if he found out we enter the same room alone."

"You're talking nonsense." Rio started to usher the young man towards the balcony. Some of the servants greeted her, but she greeted back quickly without stopping her track.

"Yes, I'm absolutely aware of that. The real question is how come you managed to make the same mistake, twice? I mean, you're not learning anything from the last time you did that."

"In my defense, this would not be a mistake—at least for me," she replied, didn't miss a beat.

"And you thought I was crazy?"

She didn't respond and continued to make her way through hallways that was getting more desolate the further they went. There was only the sound of their footsteps clicking on the marble floor, and just then he realized that she had worn high-heeled shoes like she usually wore—instead of barefoot like she had been the day before. Now she looked like a proper lady and he would have thought so if she wasn't gripping his upper arm a bit too tightly that he suspected was the result of the last few months punching the sandbag. But that hardly mattered now. He wondered if the balcony she was referring to was not the one overlooking the training ground (he had only been to that balcony) and if it was a bad idea after all. Oh, well, he was dead by the time they return to Ryouga anyway, he'd spent the last few hours of his life making bad decisions after the other.

After what seemed like endless hallway, she made one last turn and walked towards the door at the end of it. Behind the door, there was a spiraling staircase which he immediately recognized as one of the castle's towers.

"Do we have to go this far? With his state now, Ryouga wouldn't believe that we're just going to talk," IV commented as they started to climb up the stairs.

"This place is perfect."

"Yes, if I'm going to have my wicked way to you!"

"Don't you like to charm women, or am I not woman enough for you?"

"Ryouga's aside. With recent discovery of your midnight routine, I decided that I like to keep my appearance unmarred."

Rio scoffed and said, "'Scars makes men looks sexy,' was what I believe you said years ago?"

IV pointed his cross-shaped scar on his face. "You don't get scars like this for making a pass at women."

"Ryouga thought you did anyway," she pointed out.

He glared at her, ignoring her interruption and continued, "The least they could get is a broken nose. Any worse than that depends on how violent the girl is, or the brother."

"I'll have you know that most girls find crooked nose to be attracting. Many crooked-nosed men are someone with shady reputation, and they said it looks sexier."

"Oh, is that why you tried to marry that geezer? You find his 'shady reputation' to be sexy?"

"Touché. But I'm not 'most girls', fortunately." She finally stopped when they had reached the top of the tower and released his arm. "Okay, so, let's talk politics."

"Oh, I see. No one will overhear us here. But that still put my life in danger against Ryouga," he mused, looking down from the tower's balcony to the castle ground that was spread under their feet, giving him a very nice view of the island.

"I'll make sure that Ryouga can't harm you after we're done with this deal. Now, tell me why you're so desperate to be married off? You don't seem like the type for settling down," she started right down the business.

IV leaned his body to the railing, enjoying the breeze swept his cheek and his red and golden lock softly. "I'm not _that_ desperate. I just thought I would impress my brother by getting ahead of him."

"And you don't seem the type that'd impress other unless your life depends on it. So, I believe you're quite desperate."

"Whatever works for you, woman. But I'm on this trial as a king before I could get what I want. And if I could prove my worth, he'll speed down the business, probably," IV explained the summarized version of his situation.

"And does it have to be marriage?"

The young King of Arclight Kingdom shrugged. "I figured that's the last thing my brother would expect from me. So, why not get the fun while I'm at it?"

"What fun are you referring to?" she asked slyly and he only rolled his eyes as response. "Say, if I do agree to play along in this, what'd you tell the world? You're going to steal someone else's fiancée, after all."

"Again, you're not yet his fiancée, technically speaking. Now, can I ask a few questions in turn? You can continue with yours after I'm done. This is not an interrogation; it's a deal where both parties have to agree with each other's terms."

"Oh, I didn't know that's the definition of a deal," she replied sarcastically, leaning her back to the railing. "Go ahead then, ask away."

He ignored her sarcasm and started, "I know you're not tactless, so what's with the daredevil?"

This time, it was her turn to shrug. "He insulted my people, I insulted back, and you've heard the rest from Ryouga. As simple as that."

"That's not what Ryouga think, apparently. Next question; did you receive my proposal just to tick your brother off or do you really think it's a good idea?"

"What's now, identity crisis?" she smirked, which received his scowling face in return. "Honestly, that's still a bad idea—as well as a bad joke. But I think it's better than marrying him. Besides, I can tick Ryouga's off, which is certainly a bonus without having to be the victim myself."

"So, the fact that I'm this charming, good-looking, young King is not enough bonuses?" he shot back, returning her smirk. "And you do realize that whatever agreement we'll come to, it's still an arranged marriage where you have roles to play, right? I still need you to play the supporting wife role to convince my brother that this isn't some of my recent daredevil stunt."

"I don't blame your brother for having such suspicion. It IS a daredevil for you, isn't it?" she nodded when he looked away with another scowl, a sign that she had quite close to hitting the mark. "Trying to prove your worth and all that. I'm not being sarcastic. That's what exactly I did. But as good as I'm in theory, I still don't have much experience on the field."

"Well, I'm bad at theories, so we'll do fine together, I guess."

"Okay," Rio said, clapping her palm. "Now, what will each of us get out of it, and how's it going to be done?"

IV propped his chin with a hand. "Since you're still not technically his fiancée, I could still use the reasoning that I fall for you and tried my hardest to court you."

"Technicality means nothing to that old geezer. What if he declared war on you? What'll you do, then?"

"My brother will take care of it. I don't usually praise someone, but he's good at what he's doing; mainly controlling people."

"What makes you think he's going to take your side? I'm pretty sure he'd also think that this is a really stupid idea and would convince you to call off everything."

The young King chuckled. "Well, that's the brilliance of this plan. You barely met with that old man, right? He hadn't even visited you since the last time you two met in a social function. And even though I just arrived here yesterday, that's more than enough time to gather as many gossips flying around the castle and even among people out there."

The blunette turned to her side and raised her eyebrows at the laughing young man beside her. "And…?"

"You're being pitied by your own people, and they'd support whatever that'd make you free from such fate. Everyone likes good romance, and my brother's a people person. He'll go where the mob takes him."

Rio frowned. "I seem to fail to grasp just how you'd convince _our_ people to believe that you're giving us a favor? You still have the reputation of being troublemaker, no thanks to your behavior back then."

"That's where I'll show you why I'm called the charmer," he closed the sentence with said charming smile, as if trying to prove his point.

"I'm not really convinced, though, but as long as you take all the blame, I'm washing my hands clean from it, then." She sighed, holding her hands up. "Now, I do have a few conditions for this agreement, unless you'd prefer to state yours first?"

"Name it, and I'll think about mine after hearing yours. I still don't know what to expect in this, after all."

"First, you will not touch me if I don't want to. And by touch, I don't mean mere hands-holding or lip-contact, that might be necessary when we're out in the public. Oh, well, you know what I mean…" she stated, losing her cool a little at the end of the sentence.

"Done."

Rio blinked. "What?"

"I said 'done'. Even if you didn't ask it, Ryouga would make sure of that anyway. I've been anticipating that. So, done."

She eyed him suspiciously, but since he made a really good point about Ryouga, she let it slide and continued. "Second, I can come and go out of your country whenever I want."

"As long as they won't suspect you of cheating."

"I'm not that cheap," she cut in sharply, glaring at him.

"With the way your brother looks after you, I don't doubt that. But a country consisted of people with different ideas and some of them gets really weird some times. I prefer to avoid that."

"Alright, Mr. Smart Pants. I'm going to take my job very seriously. I'll have escorts or whatever needed as long as I don't have to be confined in your castle. Fine." She rolled her magenta orbs and waved her hand carelessly. "Now, for the third condition."

"You know what? I'm already enjoying this," he commented, which received her raised eyebrows but ignored the remark.

"I'm not responsible for any stupid idea you concoct while we're in this agreement. If there's any insinuation of it, either by gossip or assumption, you'll have to deny it and take the blame yourself."

"And here I thought marriage is a two-way street." IV pouted, but then laughed. "And you've already said that."

"I know, I just want to make it official by putting it into agreement."

"Girl, you're paranoid."

"After my latest blunder, I think it's only natural that I heightened my guard. I'm not repeating the same mistake."

"Whatever. Let's shake on it while I haven't changed my mind. You can draw a document for this later and I'll sign it, if that makes you feel safer." IV held out a hand.

Rio received his hand and gripped it a bit too tightly. "Thrilled to work with you, King IV." She furrowed her forehead. "That sounds a bit off no matter how many times I pronounce it. Maybe I should've asked for the fourth condition to allow me to know your real name?"

"You can simply ask my brothers, or sift through secret documents in our library, maybe you'll get lucky," IV replied.

The blunette shrugged again and said, "Well, I'll find out, one way or another. Meanwhile, we have a more pressing matter to think about."

"Dropping the bomb to Ryouga? This, I cannot wait." IV popped his knuckles one by one, trying and failing to hide his Adam's apple bobbed as he said so.

Of course, Rio noticed the subtle movement on his neck. "Are you cowering?"

"Not in my lifetime. I'd rather kill myself than having to admit that I'm utterly terrified of my soon-to-be brother-in-law."

"You just did."

"You're the girl I _love_. I'm allowed to act like stupid around you."

"You always do, anyway," she muttered, hooking her arm to his. "Okay, now, let's show the world how much we _love_ each other."

* * *

 ** _Word Count_** _: 2,918_

 ** _A/N_** _And that's when the romance began! XD Reviews are always welcome!_


	8. Chapter 8: The Bystanders

**Chapter 8: The Bystanders**

 ** _Disclaimer_** _: Of course I don't own YGO Zexal, heck, I don't even own the general concept of cheesy-romance flick. So, shut up and just read if you want. XOXO_

* * *

It was near the end of spring and into the summer; more flowers started to bloom, decorating the garden like someone had poured multicolored paint all over it. Durbe's room, in particular, got a really nice portion of view, being in the second floor with a nice and comfortable window seat to enjoy said view. But even with all those beauty spread under him, he couldn't erase the unease he had been feeling since the guest's arrival the other day.

Sure, the guy visited here in regular basis and Ryouga was always having a good time whenever he came, so he couldn't really complain for it gave Ryouga a moment of reprieve from his duties. Ryouga had always taken his responsibilities as the King quite seriously and there wasn't much time for him to socialize like normal teenagers did, so a visit from an 'important' friend was a good excuse for him to relax without fully abandoning his duties.

This particular one, however, always caused some sort of trouble whenever he was around. He could still remember how their first encounter had been years ago, and the visits following it had never been peaceful—to say the least. One thing to look forward to whenever the two of them met was heated argument over almost everything, then the friendly match in the training ground before he eventually returned to his home. Rio had always made herself scarce whenever he was around, so it wasn't too uncalled for if he regard this situation to be rather weird.

The two siblings had always been arguing ever since that fiasco with King of Vector Kingdom, but they never did that in front of relative stranger, even got said stranger involved in it. Of course he had discussed the matter with Ryouga several times, trying and failing to find a way out of it, and from a few seconds of involuntary eavesdropping when he passed Ryouga's study on his way to the training ground this afternoon, it seemed like they were discussing the same thing with raised voice and cursing flying between them. He had seen the three of them entering the room, but one voice was, strangely, missing from that argument.

The silver-haired young man had been wondering what was exactly they were talking about, but he still had his duties to attend—mainly to supervise the soldiers' training—so he hadn't been able to find out until the guest departed that evening, and Ryouga was back sorting through reports he had to read and sign in his study and he was standing by his side, as usual.

"We need to tighten the guards around the disaster area. I'll write the detail for accounting staffs later, but this needs to be done first," Ryouga said—almost sounded like a snap—as he shoved the paper like he was already sick of reading it. He grabbed another one from the stack of unread documents and skimmed through it in one glance.

"We've drilled a well just a month ago in this area. We can't drill another one or the ground will collapse," he said, shoving it away to the other stack.

"The people complained that it doesn't provide much to water their field," Durbe added.

"The working system is; they draw water from the mountain to water the field, they can use the goddamn river to wash their clothes, and the well is for drinking only. I don't want to hear anymore complain from some lazy ass who doesn't want to do some extra work of climbing up the mountain to check on their drainage system. That's it."

Durbe frowned at the cursing. Ryouga would curse from time to time when he was feeling snappish—usually because he was frustrated at something. The real question was what brought this on?

"I get where you came from, but farming is a hard work, you know. Maybe we should assign men to check on their behalf so that they wouldn't feel too left out." Durbe offered, approaching the topic carefully.

Ryouga was silent for a few moment, looking sullen as he contemplated Durbe's suggestion. "Let them assign their own men to do it. We don't have time to take care of it one by one. I'll raise their pay or something."

The silver-haired young man nodded. "I'll note that for the next Council Meeting," he said. "Speaking of Council Meeting, the first thing they'll bring up is definitely about the marriage—"

"Screw them. We're not doing anything about it until I hear from Arclight again. If they initiate the topic, just say it's being taken care of by my colleague." Ryouga dismissed it, didn't take his eyes off of the other document he was reading.

"Is everything alright back then with King IV?" Durbe finally asked, feeling rather surprised that his King dismissed the topic without explanation. He knew something happened between the three of them, and if Ryouga acted like this, it couldn't be good.

Ryouga didn't answer right away and studied the papyrus laid in front of him. "Yes, everything's fine," he answered absently. After a few moments, he sighed and added, "No, of course you've heard that. I think even the dead could hear that."

"I didn't mean to snoop around, but couldn't help to hear that you two had a really savage one today," Durbe said neutrally

"Savage is an understatement. I didn't know Rio could be this vindictive. And by vindictive, I didn't mean her attempts at making that poor envoy's visit as miserable as possible, this is beyond mad, Durbe…" Ryouga uttered, more to himself that to anyone in particular. He hadn't realized that he was this stressed out until Durbe asked.

Now, this was new. Ryouga wasn't the type to run his mouth. If anything, staying silent was one of his crisis-management moves, where he would let the young King figure things out and then prepared himself to be of any assistance if needed. This time however, was different.

"What was it exactly were you talking about?"

"Sit down, please, we need to talk," Ryouga said again and Durbe complied, sitting down on the chair across Ryouga's, without saying a word.

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.

.

"No, I'm not doing this," V said firmly. "This is mad, you're mad, and I'm going to add new rules to the agreement so there wouldn't be anything like this anymore."

"Come on, what do you know about love? Your own wife knocked you out on your wedding night," IV retorted, scoffing at the end.

"Like you'd know any better?" V retorted back.

It had only been a week since IV was declared as the King, and V had already regretted his decision. He came marching back from his visit to United Land of Poseidon Ocean Kingdom, looking giddy and suddenly announced that he was _in love_. The silver-haired man had half-suspected that this was probably one of his brother's attempts at making him regret his decision to appoint him as the King.

"I'm not falling for that," he had said when his brother had finished narrating how he couldn't take his eyes off from the blue-haired princess of United Land of Poseidon.

There was no way he was serious, was what he had initially thought, but then realized that even though his younger brother was one hell of an actor and could fool the masses as good as him—if not better—he certainly _did not_ do _giddy_. For one, it was the most inelegant act one would play and as much as they both like to get on each other's nerves, they'd avoid anything that'd humiliate themselves while they did so.

"I'm going there again next week, whether you agree or not. I'm not losing her to some old geezer," IV said resolutely, turning away and marching out of his brother's study.

V watched the red-and-gold haired young man receding back, trying to find something weird with the way he acted—anything that could prove that he wasn't serious. But the only weird thing he could spot was the fact that his brother was gushing about someone that wasn't himself and for once in his lifetime, in his honest opinion that wasn't driven by sheer annoyance, his brother did look dumb— _lovestruck_ dumb.

No, no, no, there had to be something wrong with the way he judged things. He was so used anticipating trouble or some gimmick that he might have forgotten how normal human acted. If his brother had been acting, then he had underestimated his acting ability and his guts to ever take such a drastic measure just to tick him off. But if he was serious…

He didn't even want to think that far, knowing that this screamed trouble right from the start. And he would definitely not hear the end of it if he admitted defeat within two week after the agreement was struck, so backing down was never an option. He would either outsmart him in one week time or let the situation unfold himself. He knew his brother could only hold the act for so long before he burst. It had always been the game of durability between them; both physically and mentally. He could still play this game. His brother had mentioned that he was going back there next week, which meant he was given that much time to figure out how to counter this stunt—if he could, at all. He was almost convinced that his brother was serious this time, and when his brother did serious, he meant _serious_.

Now, that was the real trouble.

Absently, V rubbed his temple and slumped down the chair he had been sitting in the last few hours. He still had loads of paperworks to take care of, but with recent development, he figured he wouldn't be able to focus anyway. He needed something to refresh his mind and was about to rise from his seat when his legs were being grasped by two plump arms, followed by a girly squeal.

"Da!"

The silver-haired man was taken aback for a fragment of second, sitting up straight and looked down to his legs, where a little girl—no more than 3 years old—with magenta-streaked silver hair, was climbing up it. He chuckled at the sight and bent his hip forward, lifting the little bundle up his lap.

"I swear you've gotten bigger since the last time I saw you," he said when the little girl immediately hugged him the moment she saw his face.

"Da!" she squealed again, burying her face in V's shoulder.

"Who's daddy's girl now?" he hugged back, enjoying the warm comfort of her plump embrace. It was nice being needed—even only as a human cushion.

Up until four years ago, if he was asked who his favorite person was, he would have answered his father as the one he respected most. But now, it was his daughter, Mikki. At first, he had dreaded the prospect of him being a father. He had witnessed, decades ago, when his brothers had just been born, that a baby was nothing more than annoying bundle that wouldn't stop screaming and flailing and did the opposite of whatever you told them to. But his little daughter turned out to be a lot more like him that he couldn't help but spoiled her rotten. His wife would often comment that he had poisoned their daughter with an unhealthy habit of being overly serious, but he saw no harm in it and would, instead, boast that it was his _superior_ gene that'd be better off populating the world.

"I'd love to see what will your _inferior_ gene produce? I hope it's your brother's miniature," said his wife that time.

Speaking of wife, his daughter was supposed to visit her grandparents in Astral Kingdom until next weekend with her. Not that he was complaining that he had his number one fan with him at his most stressful moment, but the early return might be caused by something, and he didn't need additional trouble right now.

Mikki didn't look particularly upset when she released her hug. If anything, her face flushed pink and wide smile adorned her round cheeks. She stretched out a hand and he played with it for a moment. It was true when people said happiness was contagious. He felt hundred times better when he saw that rosy, adorable smile.

"You're early," he said, turning his head to another intruder entering his study a few minutes after the little girl—a young woman with magenta hair.

"Well, I've heard you're on to some crazy stuffs, so I dashed straight back here to see if I've lost my title as your queen," she remarked sarcastically.

"You do, in a way. How's your brother doing?" he asked back, turning the topic of the conversation away from the very thing he tried to take off his mind.

"As goofy as usual, and I saw him planning for another adventure with dad before I return here," she answered, sitting on the chair across from her husband. "Speaking of adventure, why don't you suggest Thomas to come along with them? You can't trust him to go alone, right? My dad might not be the best keeper, but he has pretty high standards, too."

The little girl on his lap was now playing around with his braided hair, chatting incoherent things, but he paid no heed to it and replied, "He won't go anywhere far for the time being. He's _in love_ , now."

Akari blinked once, twice, trying to process what he had just said. Then she guffawed. "What is it now? Do I smell defeat? Did you actually believe that Thomas is capable of _falling in love_? You know he's just trying to mess around with you, right?"

"I wish I could be that sure. But you have to see for yourself."

"Okay, tell me first what led him to do that? You must have done serious damage to his psyche that he ever thought of such thing. I'll meet him after you spill everything," she started, looking excited. "Anything that got you worked up must be very interesting."

V looked at his wife, looking betrayed but also too tired to start an argument, so he began his narration as to how everything started.

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"My father has gone crazy, man," Rei started, putting down the glass on the stone counter.

The two listeners glanced at each other, one brown-haired young man with bangs partly covering one of his emerald orbs and the other was a big, burly young man with spiked up, green hair. At first glance, it'd only look like some friends sitting in a bar, drinking, exchanging stories, and catching up with one another. No one would have expected them to be someone of great importance from where they came from. For one, they were wearing hooded cloak that covered most of their fine clothes and armories—if any. But being used to travel far, they knew better than to attract the ruffians with unnecessary accessories, so they appeared as modest as any other patrons in their favorite bar located in between the borders of their countries—without looking too unkempt and shady, of course.

From the way the three of them blended just right into the background, it was pretty clear that they had been here more than once already. In fact their first encounter had been there, and they had been some sort of 'drinking buddy' ever since. They'd regal each other with stories of what they have been doing or recent happenings around them.

"That's not news, though. What did he up to this time?" the brown haired one, Alito, asked, emptying his glass.

"Marrying someone young enough to be my sister?" the orange-haired young man answered.

Again, the two other listeners looked at each other. "Well, it's not like the first time it was done. Some other countries still practice it…" the burly one, Girag, responded this time.

"That doesn't make it any less cringeworthy. My father had lost some real shit along with mother. I can't take it anymore," Rei said, more like pleading, downing his own drink 'til there wasn't a drop left.

"You're always welcome at my place for an indefinite amount of time. We could always use some new challenger," Alito offered, already had his glass filled to the brim with another round of ale.

"And just go missing like that? My father would have a fit enough to destroy a country. For someone who couldn't care less about reputation, he sure took a good care of me."

"You need to do something about it, man," Girag said.

"You mean, 'put an end' to it?" Rei laughed mirthlessly. "I tried, I failed, and he started calling me pussy ever since."

"If you need help, we can plot something together," Alito offered. "I'm not fan of causing some big scene, but even the Prince wouldn't agree to such thing. We can always use the power of the mob."

"Which mob are you talking about? Surely not my father's mob right? It's a sick country filled with sick people and I'm sick of it all."

Silence ruled among them again as they gulped down another round of drink. The topic about Rei's father had always been a sore one and they had had round after round of discussion over it to no avail. For one, they were no more than young men, barely out of their teenage years, and they had little to no control over things happened around them—especially those were done by the grownups.

"Even if you've given up, there are people who are actually disgusted with the state of your country. They just need some more leverage to advance. You could be their messiah," Alito said after a moment of silence.

"Why don't _you_ be their messiah? Or your Prince, or whoever has the guts to do that. I'm done being called a pussy," Rei muttered sulkily.

"Then you _are_ a pussy. It's your country and therefore is your responsibility. We're just outsiders, and we need some strong leverage to pull it off."

"Thank you very much for the encouragement." Rei lifted the glass in mock cheer. "But I think I'll take your offer to stay at your place until things quieted down. Then I'll meet my future mother."

"Who's going to be your 'mother', anyway? What country is desperate enough to marry off its Princess to some old geezer?" Girag asked.

"United Land of Poseidon Ocean, that, for some reason, is my father's sworn enemy," Rei explained.

"Oh, I've heard that one. They're suffering from some disaster, I think," Alito interrupted. "That explains the reason, though. Have you ever met her?"

"We're _enemies_ , Alito."

"Well, she's quite a catch, I must say. I almost suspected your father staged the whole things up if not for the fact that it was natural disaster that wrecked their land."

The young Prince of Vector Kingdom scoffed. "My father is a natural disaster."

"He's your father." Girag pointed out.

"Whatever," Rei said carelessly, stopping halfway and lifted his half-full glass again. "Cheers for our youth."

"Just don't say we're not helping." Girag shrugged and lifted his glass too, leaving Alito sighed in defeat and lifted his glass slightly before gulping their drink down simultaneously.

* * *

 ** _Word Count_** _: 3,233_

 ** _A/N_** _Here's some filler chapter from minor character's point of view. It'd be fun if I could insert Mizael, Kaito, and the others too, but considering they wouldn't be too relevant to the plot, I think I'll refrain from unnecessarily prolonging the story. And, shoutout to_ _rt1369_ _and_ _pentafish_ _for the reviews and suggestion (especially about Vector Kingdom's name that I still haven't able to decide. I'll probably use the dub name anyway :p). Reviews are always welcome!_


	9. Chapter 9: In Motion

**Chapter 9: In Motion**

 ** _Disclaimer_** _: Of course I don't own YGO Zexal, heck, I don't even own the general concept of cheesy-romance flick. So, shut up and just read if you want. XOXO_

* * *

To say that the plan was well and in motion was an understatement. Durbe almost believed what he saw, even after what Ryouga had explained. He knew that the second Prince of Arclight Kingdom—now King—was quite a charmer, but he hadn't known he was _this_ good.

Sitting in one of the gazebo placed in the middle of inner garden like he owned the place was no other than IV himself. Rio was right by his side, although maintaining her distance, and listened intently to the red-and-gold haired young man's story. Sometimes she would laugh—and it didn't look staged. The man was probably telling her how his brother had reacted when he announced about his intention. The silver-haired young man would like to hear about that too, but again, it wasn't his place.

"…they look good…"

Durbe heard what some of the servants said when he walked past them standing before the hallway window facing the garden where IV and Rio was. If he didn't know any better, he would've thought like that too. Rio was like a sister to him and he wanted what was best for her. But knowing the truth, he felt a bit wary with the situation right now—channeling Ryouga's. Strangely, though, Ryouga made himself scarce this time under the pretext of having to deal with his job. Now, that was even more reason to be worried.

The silver haired young man knew that Ryouga disapproved of the agreement, but just let things unravel itself as they didn't see the harm in it. Besides, they had it on writing and they got nothing to lose anyway. But now, seeing it actually worked so far, he now knew why Ryouga had confessed to feel the butterfly fluttering at the pit of his stomach; not because Rio was going to marry IV, but the consequence they'd face should the plan failed.

Humiliation was the least of their concern. They'd be lucky if they could still maintain their lives to be ashamed of anything by the end of this ordeal. War was definitely to be expected—in traditional or even metaphorical sense. And even if they did prevail, there was no telling if something was going to befall the Arclight instead. At that point, Rio was already part of them, so even if it sounded like a win-win situation for them, it wasn't. The risks were similar, just a tiniest bit better than the other.

Maybe he'd better off not knowing and stayed blissfully oblivious to the theatrical act happening before him. But it was too late now. He could only hope that this was enough to solve everything.

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.

.

"My God, I wish I was there…" Rio said after she finished laughing her heart out upon hearing IV's tale about his brother's reaction. She sat up straight, reaching for the fruit bowl and dragged it to their direction as she leaned back to the cushion near the railings where she and IV had been resting their back, talking.

IV raised his eyebrows upon seeing her picked up a grape and put it before his lips. "Going all out already?"

"Shut up and just eat the damn grape with that wide, charming smile of yours. It's your plan to begin with," Rio hissed through her toothy grin.

"Is this place visible to Ryouga's study?" IV asked, taking the grape with his teeth. "It'd be even more delightful to have him puke over this spectacle."

The blue-haired princess smiled broadly. "I didn't choose this place randomly, you know?"

"You read my mind, girl," IV said as he started chewing the fruit without taking his eyes off the girl before him.

It had been fun, so far, and he was satisfied with the reaction he got. Everything went according to plan in barely a month after the agreement was struck. On top of it, Ryouga didn't interfere, and he felt unbearably smug seeing that he kept winning this far. The only obstacle left was V, who was still skeptic over the whole situation. He didn't mind a good challenge, especially from his 'perfect' brother, but he was on a really tight schedule right now.

"You know I have less than two weeks here? Your brother should have witnessed this firsthand! How many convincing does he need?" the blunette hissed again—echoing what he had just thought—picking another grape for herself this time.

"With the way things are progressing, he's going to give way once I'm home this time," the red-and-gold haired young King said, full of conviction.

"Just remember that Ryouga would delightfully disembowel you should you fail," she said, putting another grape in between his lips again.

Oh, well, at least he was having fun in the last few days of his life, he thought.

"Do you think announcing that I can't live without you tonight is too premature?" IV said after a few moments of silence, eating grapes.

Rio rolled her magenta orbs. "It's your plan, remember?"

"Most of the servants have given me thumbs up, though."

"Well, we—you need your brother's thumb up."

"As a matter of fact, it's not really necessary. I can do it myself, but it's easier with him guarding my back."

"That still means we need his approval. Just shut up and get the job done!" Rio snapped, shoving another grape to his mouth.

"Patience, love." He slipped the fruit inside his mouth, licking her fingers in process. "Didn't you mention that the Envoy from Vector Kingdom is coming this evening?"

"I see," Rio murmured, wiping her fingers with the fabric of his clothes. "So, heartfelt declaration of love tonight?"

"I'm counting on you, then."

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"I've heard some unsettling rumors."

 _Yeah, no shit_ , Ryouga thought, sighing inwardly. _That's what you get when you live in a country full of perverted, bloodthirsty animals you call human_.

He never liked any kind of Royal Advisor, but he _resented_ this one in particular. The fact that he was the envoy from Vector Kingdom was enough explanation, and he had to exhaust every last drop of his energy to face him.

"Have you heard about the Arclight Kingdom?" the Advisor, a middle-aged man with dark hair streaked with silver every here and there, asked, sipping his wine.

 _Of course I know, moron_. "They're our allies," Ryouga answered. "We maintain good relationship over the past few years."

"Unfortunately, the unsettling rumors I heard is about them—one of them."

 _Just get to the point already!_ Ryouga seethed quietly, pretending to be busy reading the paper before him, anything to divert his attention from the Advisor's pointy face.

"He seems to show great interest to your Princess. Just a few days ago, before my departure, we received a correspondence from their Regent, saying that they do not wish any war with us no matter what the outcome will be."

"Oh." Ryouga raised his face at that. He knew that the plan was well and in motion, but he hadn't expected that it'd really worked this far. If what the Advisor said was true, then it was only a matter of time before the Arclight's Regent surrender to his brother. "It is true that the King himself visits here quite often in the past few weeks. In fact, he's here right now. It's his third visit this month."

"Where's he right now?" the Advisor sat up straight, putting down his wine glass on the desk, face looking serious.

Almost as if on cue, the door to the study opened, revealing IV behind it with Rio in tow. They were doing a really god job acting as if they fell in love with each other so far, even Ryouga had to admit that to the point he wanted to puke. But would that be enough?

"Good evening," IV declared, sweeping the room in one quick glance and looking surprised when he saw the Vector Kingdom's Advisor. "What a pleasant surprise."

The Advisor stood up, holding up a hand. "Good evening, King IV of the Arclight Kingdom."

"Envoy from Vector Kingdom, I believe?" IV received the hand and shook it amicably. "Alright, this will speed things up."

"IV," Rio squeezed his hand, looking like she was about to say something.

The red-and-gold haired young King leaned close to her, kissing their intertwined fingers as he said, "Will you wait outside while I take care of this?"

The blunette stared nervously at the envoy, then at IV before she nodded slightly and released her hand. IV murmured something while closing the door. When he turned to face the other occupants of the room, Ryouga was propping his head, facing another direction with disgust clearly plastered on his face, while the envoy eyed him suspiciously.

IV walked towards Ryouga's desk, sitting on another chair across it. "Please, sit down."

"Ah, right." The middle-aged man sat back down on his chair, automatically grabbing the wine glass on the desk.

"I believe I have to clear out some things," IV started, crossing his legs, and wasted no time.

Ryouga kept silent as he watched the exchange happened between the two. He didn't want to risk ruining IV's plan by saying some offhanded remarks after what he had seen how the two interacted, so he chose not to say anything unless prompted.

"Oh, yes, I received a letter from your brother a few days ago."

Now, that was new to IV that he didn't need to fake a slightly surprised reaction. "Oh, I didn't know about that."

"It seems like your brother is quite concerned about your relationship with Princess Rio." The envoy lifted the glass to sip the wine again.

"Yes, about that. I'm afraid I can't help but to be fascinated by my friend's sister here," he explained smoothly. "Everyone does, I believe. But since we have quite an interesting history with each other, it's more than pretty face I fell for."

The envoy smiled slightly and even IV could tell that he was just faking interest without saying anything, so he continued, "I must thank you and your King, really, for you brought out the best of her. You know she's really charming when she shows that fire of hers? I like it that she's not some wallflower waiting to be plucked."

The envoy scoffed. "Is that your taste? What use is a girl when she's not presentable? She seriously has some problems with her temper."

"If she's not your taste, why bother then? There're a lot of presentable girls out there who would willingly give their body for wealth."

The man clamped down at that, clearly at loss of words. He gulped down his wine, seemingly trying to find a witty comeback. "Well, Princess Rio is of peculiar quality. We don't want to carelessly choose our future Queen."

"Oh, I thought you said that girls have no use aside from their appearance?"

The purple-haired young King almost shouted " _Strike 2!_ " to the envoy, but managed to suppress his ever spreading grin on his face. He still couldn't bring himself to agree with IV's proposition, but it turned out to be entertaining at best as long as Rio wasn't around to act like his _lover_ or something.

"If you're willing to waste time and money to reduce such quality into a mere porcelain doll, wouldn't it be more economical if you just put makeup on one?" IV said again, oozing sarcasm at every word slipped out of his lips. "I intend to make the best of her. And I'm not just talking about bedroom matters. We could use some more lessons about divination and healing, among other things."

The corners of the envoy's lips twitched, like he was suppressing a scowl while IV tapped his fingers on the armrest of his chair, looking smug. He was on top of a game that even Rio could not pull without his help. To make matters even more satisfying, his brother had slowly admitted defeat—just like he had planned. For some crazy idea he had concocted on a whim, he couldn't help but felt extremely triumphant.

But this game was not over, yet.

"Unfortunately, everything has been arranged. You're a tad too late, Your Majesty," the envoy finally said, after a few tense moment of silence.

"I'm sure my brother can discuss things with you, or do you prefer to discuss it right now with me?" IV offered, gliding through conversation like he had won everything. He had, so far.

"King IV, I'm not sure you realize just how much troubles you're causing with this decision."

"Oh, I know perfectly well, but I just can't help myself. I'm head over heels for her. Why would bother visiting this often if I don't?" he answered casually, intertwining his fingers. "So, are we going to talk about it right now?"

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Rio waited impatiently in the library, trying and failing to concentrate on her reading.

It would soon be dinnertime, but there was no sign of Ryouga nor IV to be finishing soon. She rolled the parchment, finally decided that she wasn't in the mood for some complicated texts. She stood up, starting to make her way towards rows of desks where her acolytes read other parchments about the basic of healing.

She stopped behind a girl and asked, "Is there anything that you don't understand?"

"Um, I don't quite understand the differences between thin and string pulses, Rio-sama."

Rio peered over to see the parchment and explained, "Well, string pulse, as its name suggests, is like a string. You have to imagine the blood flows like a piece of string flew by the wind. It's really hard, indeed, you have to feel the real thing to understand it better. I'll show you when we do field practice some other times."

The girl nodded slightly, and looked conflicted—like she had something else to ask or say, but wasn't sure how to say it. So Rio asked again, "Is there anything else you want to ask?"

"It's fine so far, Rio-sama," she answered, turning a little to her direction.

The blunette nodded and said, "Just let me know if you want to ask something." She continued walking among the desks, watching them murmuring acquiescence and going back to their reading.

At the end of the row, she stopped in front of the windows overlooking the inner garden. Two rooms down the left was where Ryouga's study located. If she could, she would have jumped out of the window and peeked inside the room to see what was happening inside through the windows.

Could he pull it off? Could Ryouga play along with the scenario? What if they ended up fighting each other off since Ryouga wasn't always in the loop? Since there wasn't any shouting yet, she kind of hoped there hadn't been any undesirable rebuttal between them. But fighting didn't always involve shouting now, did it?

The Princess of United Land of Poseidon Ocean couldn't help but overthinking the worst possible scenarios. She didn't like it when she didn't have control over her own life but her choice weren't exactly abundant right now. She had no choice but to trust him and her brother.

"Rio-sama?"

Rio was snapped out from her reverie at the call of her name. She turned her head to the direction of the voice and was met with more than one pair of eyes, and they all looked worried.

"Yes, what is it?" she asked back, trying to relax her expression and released her wet, intertwined hand she hadn't realized she had been doing while looking outside the windows.

"If you're going to Vector Kingdom, who'll teach us then?" one of them asked.

"I'm not going there," she answered almost instantly, and full of conviction. Then, almost as fast as she had said that, she realized that it hadn't been fixed yet. What if she eventually had to go anyway?

"I mean… well, I can still go back here whenever I want if it's him…" she scrambled for any explanation, but was cut short.

"Him?" the other acolyte asked, looking curious.

Involuntarily, she could feel warm sensation creeping up her cheeks—more embarrassed at her own blabbering than the fact that she was talking about _him_.

"I think you'd better off with that Arclight King, Rio-sama," another one piped in. "He seems to truly like you."

"I…what?" her cheek grew warmer as she tried to find some other explanation. But she was cut short again.

"I wish you the best, Rio-sama," said another one, which followed by approving nod by the others.

She was supposed to be glad that the plan went exactly like he had described. But she wasn't exactly thrilled either for she was going somewhere else whatever the outcome. Well, she shouldn't be complaining though, after all she had done. At least she could still smack him later—whether he succeeded or not.

* * *

 ** _Word Count_** _: 2,825_

 ** _A/N_** _I know it's progressing a bit too fast, but well, the real stories will begin once they get the mumbo-jumbo done with. They could have reminiscence later on, but doing it no would only spoil the story, so I'll just speed things up, lol, deal with me a bit. And did I mention that_ _'Jewel in the Palace_ _' ('_ _Dae Jang Geum_ _' in Korean title, is a Korean (duh) historical drama) gave this story a bit of influence? I LOVE that drama a lot, like, A LOT, and I may use references from there—whether about medical or medicinal stuffs (Rio is a healer after all), or about Kingdom and all its mumbo-jumbo from here on. XD. Reviews are always welcome! :)_


	10. Chapter 10: Welcome

**Chapter 10: Welcome**

 ** _Disclaimer_** _: Of course I don't own YGO Zexal,_ _heck, I don't even own the general concept of cheesy-romance flick. So, shut up and just read if you want. XOXO_

* * *

III's first impression upon seeing the blue-haired girl was; he liked her. Not 'like' like he was into her, but more like he was happy that she was going to be family members.

Of course, he had been wary at first, meeting someone who was able to make his obstinate brother do anything to get her—even V himself was still rather skeptical towards the arrangement but had, more or less, ceased fighting just to see how far IV would get. It was hard to believe for those who knew IV well—namely the member of Royal Palace—but he chose to believe his brother had really taken his role seriously.

Rio herself seemed like a pleasant character who knew a lot of interesting things. She even showed great interest towards his research about the supernatural potential of old relic—one of a few people who could understand whatever he was saying without looking bored or distracted (V tended to be the latter, so he wasn't high on his list of people who he wanted to talk with).

"I've read about gemstones having various magic properties depending on what kind of minerals in its composition. Do you think the soil burying it has anything to do with said minerals?" Rio commented, peering over a book she was reading.

"Yes, that's exactly what I think. Which is why I believe that old relics might have certain properties that we could utilize," III said, full of enthusiasm.

"Have you ever tried it?"

"I have, but the result isn't exactly satisfactory. One of them crumbled when I used it for fueling a torch, and I had bad dreams every night for the following weeks." He shuddered at the memory. "I haven't tried anything else until I'm sure what had caused such reaction. Destroying specimen is the last thing I want to do."

"Many people died when they tried various kinds of medicine and food. Thanks to them, too, we can find what's good or not to eat now. And there'll probably a lot more of it for the sake of knowledge. At least we're not dealing with living things."

"That still doesn't make it right. There're only so much old relics we could use. I know we can't all be perfect, but we have to do as good as we could with what we have," III replied—slightly snapped at her."

Rio frowned, then smiled amusedly. "You're quite an interesting combination of your brothers, huh?" she commented. "I like it better. I hope we can be friends."

Now, it was III's turn to frown. IV hadn't told him much about how he ended up courting her, and he'd been busy with his own tasks anyway. He had thought it was just the usual banters between his brothers. But now that the person in question had actually come, he couldn't help but felt curious at the new character. He only recognized Ryouga as his brother's best friend, and he hadn't even known that IV was quite close to the sister, since she was rarely mentioned during any conversation—let alone meeting her.

But yet, here she was now; happened to pass by the library where he read at his usual time and they had been talking about various things ever since. Of course he had asked what she was doing here right after he saw her, but then, she had to mention the book he was reading and he immediately forgot about anything else.

"Did IV-niisama coerce you into this arrangement?" he asked out of nowhere, didn't realize that he had actually said that out loud until he could hear his own voice echoed in his ears. It was just something he had been thinking about since he heard that IV was bringing home his bride-to-be.

The youngest Prince of the Arclight Kingdom had suspected that his brother was just bluffing. Worst-case scenario was that IV had coerced some random girl to bring home. Rio was anything but random. They had histories with each other, not to mention Ryouga standing between them. Her remarks just then had indicated something along that line and he wondered if his brother would do so far as coercing his best friend's sister just to win this silly game.

The blunette was taken aback a bit, closed her book, and asked back, "Is it really that hard to believe?"

"Well, V-niisama has a point, you know," he said.

The Princess of the United Land of Poseidon propped her head with a hand. "Yeah, it was surprising at first since I've never seen him as the type to be romantic. But seeing that he went all this way to actually bring me here to meet your father, I guess he's serious."

"Guess?" he asked again.

She shrugged. "I'm still surprised myself. It feels surreal, I mean, with the way things are turning out in a very short amount of time."

"You're not the only one, though," III muttered, more to himself than to anyone in particular. "Are you sure this is alright? I mean, with your side?"

"Why? Afraid that Ryouga might declare war on your country?" she chuckled.

That was one of his concerns, but if she asked him that, then it might not be the case. So, he let himself relax and decided to ask something else, "What do you like about IV-niisama?"

She was silent for a while, contemplating things. "He has passion," she answered after a moment, then added with a smile, "Like you."

"Yes, but IV-niisama can be reckless sometimes. It's really disconcerting, you know? He goes out there, not knowing what he'd do or what he'd end up like. Even he bringing you here today was really unexpected."

"Don't worry, it's mutual." She laughed. "In fact, he's done more favor that I'm not sure I can repay."

The pink-haired young man tilted his head. "Favor?"

Rio only smiled again and answered, "That's the story for another time."

.

.

.

He was sharp, way sharper than his brothers.

Rio walked down the unfamiliar corridor, trying and failing to even her racing heartbeat. Everyone had been surprised seeing her actually came down here, that was to be expected, but none of them had come close to revealing the truth like III.

"I don't know what IV is planning, but since you're here now, I hope we can be friends as fellow wives of the most obstinate people on earth," Akari had said when she first met her, laughing all the while.

"Unlike your husband, I'm not that block-headed to openly admit that I'd do anything for this lovely lady here," IV said, kissing Rio's temple as he did so.

V looked like he was going to vomit but managed to twitch the corners of his mouth upward—although barely. "Well, I hope this arrangement will change him for the better," he said, smiling tiredly at the two 'lovebirds'.

It was pretty clear that Akari merely enjoyed the spectacle while V was not, judging by the black lines around his eyes indicating that he'd been having sleepless night these past few days—maybe even week. IV did say that his brother was a workaholic, so such sight wasn't something unexpected. But then again, he didn't seem like the type to be so unbecoming in front of relative stranger, so she suspected that this kind of display was caused by certain events; which was most likely the announcement of her engagement to the King of Arclight Kingdom. She almost pitied the Regent, considering how he kept getting reminded that he had lost this time, but she didn't have the leisure to think about someone else's problems.

First, there were literally tons of questions from her side—mainly her acolytes, and although she only needed to repeat telling the same thing with bubbly expression, it was no easy task as she started to get wearied by the unending surge of curious stare and inquiries about everything they could pry on her. Coming here relieved her of the annoying questions, but not so much on the 'inquisitive glares' they directed at the obvious stranger who walked by their King's side. Then, III had to ask her the real question and her heart almost leaped out of her ribcage that moment.

It was ironic, really, knowing that IV was the one coming up with the plan but the people closest to him knew nothing about it. It made their interaction felt awkward, and since she barely knew these people, that only made it doubly awkward.

"What are you doing here alone, lady?"

A familiar voice asked, followed by an arm snaked around her waist. She crossed her arm and rolled her eyes. "Aren't you a bit overdoing this?"

"I plan to get most of it while it last," he answered, pecking her temple.

"Why do you keep kissing my temple?" she asked as they walked down the corridor together, now with his arm around her.

"It looks romantic, don't you think?"

"Do you do that to your fans?"

"Jealous?"

"In your nightmare."

He laughed and answered the question anyway, "Don't worry. I'm not that touchy-feely with random someone. This is strictly business matter."

"That's reassuring." She rolled her eyes again, but felt somewhat relieved at that. At least he was decent enough compared to her other choice. "Could it be that you have proximity issues?"

He was silent for a few moments and she started to fear that she might have hit a sore spot. She was about to apologize when he preceded her. "Or maybe I'm simply untouchable?" he said with a smirk.

The blunette shoved her elbow to his rib slightly, but he didn't release his arm and only laughed again as she sighed inwardly. She had never seen him as the type to hold grudge or even getting upset over a small insult. But only then did she realize that she knew next to nothing about someone who was going to be her husband—although temporarily. That was probably one of the causes to Ryouga's discomfort about this arrangement. But well, this was still better.

Almost as quick as she thought that, she realized what she was doing. This wasn't good. She started telling herself stuffs to make her feel better. Now she felt like an ungrateful prick. Her predicament then had been her own doing and she was lucky to be able to get out of it practically unscathed. Sure, it wasn't her first choice, but she shouldn't be complaining right now. They were just starting after all.

"III almost blew our cover story to smithereens," she blurted out anything else to divert her attention.

IV raised an eyebrow, clearly surprised but maintaining his composure. "That's bound to happen—one way or another. It's just a bit quicker than I previously thought. What did you say to him?"

"I might have implied something in my manner of speaking. But that's not the problem, by the way. Doesn't anyone in your family know about this?"

"I need genuine reaction and support. My brother—V, I mean—would give me twice the nightmare of whatever that Vector King would give if he ever found out about this."

Rio rolled her eyes at that. "One thing that I admire you of, Your Majesty, is your ability to praise yourself without making it sound too obvious. Your brother can't be that formidable given how he gave up easily for this kind of baloney."

"I'm deeply humbled by your kind compliment."

"What about III, then? Should we distract him with something so he'd stop suspecting?"

"No. He's hardly a liability. If anything, he'd sympathize on you once he heard about that other _arrangement_."

"Tell him everything, then. Spare me the awkwardness."

The young King of Arclight Kingdom shrugged. "He'll find out when the time comes. I don't think it's wise to tempt fate this early."

"Said someone who challenged the number one shrewd King of the century."

"I beg to differ. He's just overrated simpleton." He said firmly.

She was silent for a moment, about to debate just to be contrary but soon found out that she couldn't help but agree. "You're right. They're simpletons, what's with them only having the three basic animal needs."

He smirked at that. "You should meet my father, then tell me the definition of shrewd again—the revised one."

"Are we going to meet your father now?" she asked curiously.

"Of course. He's thrilled to finally meet the girl who could bend his obstinate son into a respectful King."

"Was that sarcasm? Because I can't stand being seen as a dominatrix."

"See for yourself, then." He closed the conversation with that as they finally reached their destination.

The two of them stopped in front of an elaborate wooden door, she presumed leading to his father's study room. He knocked three times, and when a muffled response was heard from the other side, he pushed it open slowly.

It was still midday, but the interior of the room was a stark contrast to the naturally illuminated hallway they just passed to get there. It looked, more or less, like any other study room she had seen, but with less light and no window. For one, it was really dim, with only a few lighting from several brass sconces on the wall and the desk lamp. A warm-looking rug covered most of the wooden floor, while the wall was covered by towering bookshelves up to the ceiling, adorned with heavy-looking books and other wooden trinkets. There was a sofa at the other side of the room, a carved wooden desk in the middle.

Sitting behind the desk was a middle aged, sandy-haired man wearing a monocle, which reminded her more of a perpetual scholar than someone who had once been a King. With that look, she was pretty sure that he had read all those books arranged in the bookshelves around him—and maybe even the ones in their rather huge library. She wasn't sure if he would actually be fooled by an amateur's trick like IV's plan.

"Father, this is Rio. Rio, this is Byron, my father," IV announced, drawing her closer to him as if to seek some comfort before a rather intimidating presence.

Byron smiled warmly, and to someone who didn't know their background, it would still appear so. But she realized that IV tensed slightly when they entered the room and she could feel it too. Byron didn't look even the slightest intimidating, but that was made him even more formidable because one couldn't simply judge him from the look alone. To make matters worse, they were _really_ in some sort of act, making her felt too self-aware that she had to make a really convincing one to get through this obstacle—if she could at all.

"It's a pleasure to finally meet you, Princess Rio. Sit down, please, you two," Byron said, rising a little from his seat and gesturing towards the chairs before his desk.

She might have been just imagining things, but she could feel IV's hand on her waist tightened a bit before releasing it as they sat down on each chair. Rio intended to lean her back to the back of the chair, but soon found out that the chair was way too big for her that she had to scoot back further. IV seemed to had found his position already, but she still squirmed in her seat, which made her doubly embarrassed when she realized that the other two occupants of the room had been staring at her—one of them frowning, while the other with a wide, warm smile plastered on his face.

"Surely it's not really comfortable being in a new place," Byron started. "On such short notice, even." The latter was directed at his red-and-gold haired son as his golden orbs glanced slightly at the young man—who immediately squirmed at that.

"It's not entirely IV's fault, I kind of forced him to…" she stumbled her words almost automatically, didn't know why she was defending him. She might have gotten into her character way more than she had expected herself to.

"And why it has to be so?" Byron asked, and she immediately recognized the meaning behind the question.

Byron might have been out of his prime age, but he had been King once and currently a regent. There was no way he wasn't aware of her Kingdom's situation since they were allies to each other. This question was definitely a test for her. Maybe to test if she was actually serious about the whole arrangement or something along that line—she could only guess.

"It's just… I know it's quite spontaneous. But I have taken interest at him since years ago. And since the timing is just too good with our situation and all, we sort of talked and decided that it's time."

The man chuckled. "Well, our IV is, indeed, interesting. Even after raising him in the last two decades, he keeps making surprises after surprises at whatever he's doing. But nothing is as big as this one."

Rio glanced slightly at IV, who was looking obviously uncomfortable and didn't even try to hide it. It was different than the annoyed-attitude whenever he was in V's presence, but she couldn't quite put the current situation into words. Now she knew why IV had called his father 'shrewd'; while the 'uncomfortable' part of their interactions remained similar, V and IV's interaction was nothing more than a brother's banters at worst; no one was actually better than other, one of them just so happened to be at the mass' mercy than the other. At least she could sympathize with IV in this situation being looked down was never fun, especially by your own relatives who knew you inside out.

"Why don't you tell me about yourself? IV hasn't told me much given how he rushes things like this." The middle-aged man intertwined his fingers just below his chin, smiling all the while.

That was another paper-thin lie that even she could see through it the moment it was spoken. V, at least, should have told him that before and it wasn't that hard to do a background check on someone with her rank if he wanted to. She wasn't sure if she was being too self-aware or what, but she just couldn't erase that feeling of being watched. Was the question intended to see how she reacted? Maybe she was simply thinking too much now that she was surrounded by strangers who looked at her like she was some sort of circus clown. She didn't know—but the questions still needed to be answered nevertheless.

"I'm trained to be a Priest in my place, so I'm quite adept at healing and water-divination. I like reading ancient texts and learning new things," she elaborated smoothly, grateful that her nervousness didn't hinder her narration.

"III likes ancient texts too."

She brightened up at something that she recognized. "Yes, I've met him just now. He has a very interesting idea about old relic that I'd love to look into further."

"Do you wish to keep enhancing you divination art and conduct another set of research while you're doing so?"

She nodded vigorously. "By all means. I might even need to work together with III about this. I think we could arrange some sort of educational exchange between our countries?"

Byron smiled at her enthusiasm, then glanced at his son again and said, "Are you okay with that?"

"With what? III isn't interested in anything that isn't buried at least 2 feet underground for a certain amount of time—preferably more than a few decades, or doesn't have some sort of uncanny inscription written or engraved on it," IV responded without missing a beat, now looking visibly better than he had been a few minutes ago since the topic has steered away from him.

The middle-aged man laughed at that—which sounded more like a deep rumblings coming out of his throat—and she couldn't help but chuckled too. In her short time of trying to get to know him, she found out that he has a rather funny way of addressing things with his subtle but accurate wordings that one had to think before feeling insulted if spoken before the subject itself. Ryouga was a tactless rude compared to that quality of him.

"You're right," Byron said, after he finished laughing. "I'm glad that you still know your brothers better than anyone else. You know that marrying Akari was also V's own idea for political gain? You two are so much alike than anyone ever expected."

"What, didn't you decide that?" IV asked back, looking genuinely surprised.

Byron shook his head. "Playing with politic is dangerous, but playing with people's feelings are even more dangerous. I don't see the long-term benefit in it, so the thought of it never crossed my mind," he said solemnly. "Marriage for political cause might solve things in the short term, but it will only bring forth more if there's nothing changed between the two parties."

Silence for a few tense moments. Both listeners obviously looked unsure as to who was addressed in Byron's short speech just then. They didn't want to risk looking stupid by assuming things, so they just zipped their mouth up and waited until Byron diffuse the situation.

Looking at the man now, she couldn't help but realizing that Byron had all of his sons' prominent traits; V had his looks and meticulousness (judging from how things were arranged on his desk), IV had his open-mind and mischievousness, while III had his insight and warm smile. Sure, each son has unique traits of their own (and possibly some from their absent mother) and had grown into an entirely different person. Not that she knew about them well enough, but just seeing their outward appearances, she couldn't help but visioning all of them as one person before her.

Inwardly, she blushed. Byron gave her strange feeling at the pit of her stomach. He was the type of men that struck her to be able to intimidate other or give them comfort just by being nice, depending on which side you were on, just like her father had been. If she could pick someone to marry, she'd definitely choose Byron's type. Absently, she wondered if his sons would eventually grow up to be like him someday.

"Anyway," Byron said, finally breaking the uncomfortable silence. "Welcome to our family, Rio. And I hope my son takes good care of the love of his life."

Rio was sure that last one was sarcasm.

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 ** _Word Count_** _: 3,781_

 ** _A/N_** _Reviews are always welcome! :)_


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